


Geometry

by Windian



Category: Frozen - Fandom
Genre: Asexual!Elsa, Drug Use, Gen, Half sisters, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Modern AU, One-Shots, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-23
Updated: 2015-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-20 13:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 23,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1511678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Windian/pseuds/Windian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After her mother's death, Elsa moves in with her father's family and meets the younger sister she'd spent her whole life hearing about. But the Andersons are from another world; obscenely rich, they live in a pristine penthouse in a glass sky-rise. Anna skips school, smokes, pops pills and is desperately unhappy. Can these two new sisters mutually inspire one another to live? A series of one-shots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. geometry

Their father set the last bag down on the cream sofa. "I have to go to work now, so I'll leave the two of you to get acquainted," he said. Behind the gleaming teak kitchen counter, Elsa saw her sister's look of panic. "If you'd just... show Elsa her room, help her get settled in, Anna," he said, askance in his voice. Anna responded by with folded arms, thrusting forward her lower jaw.

" _Fine."_

Stood by the massive windows that covered half of the fish bowl penthouse apartment, Elsa shuffled her notebook under her other arm. She thought that if there awards given out for the most awkward moment ever, most of today would be a top contender.

"I'll be back this evening then. Have fun girls," said their father, false cheer, as he pulled up the door behind him.

And left them alone.

"Fun, he says," Anna quipped, as she strode to the refrigerator, mary-janes flopping, the backs crushed down under her heels. She reached inside for a bottle of sunny delight, cut-off shorts exposing white thigh. She drank straight from the bottle.

From an awkward meeting at the bus station, to an even more awkward car ride, Elsa could still make head nor tail of her sister. She was obscenely rich. She wore a brand name jacket and shoes that would cost a month's rent for her and her mother, and then she trod on the backs. Her earrings were plastic, tacky strawberry shaped clip-ons and her thigh-high stockings had a hole. Her flame hair was tied in two lazy braids and her lipstick was gloss, cherry. She chewed gum and gazed at Elsa like she despised her.

She'd grown up, hearing so much about her sister. And now she couldn't think of a single word to say to her. Elsa gazed out the window, a panoramic landscape of the urban jungle.

 _I want to go home,_ she thought.

The plastic sunny D bottle, slamming down on the counter brought her attention back. Her sister leant against it, drumming her fingers on the enamel work surface.

"Well, this is awkward," she said.

Elsa didn't say a thing. Her sister sighed.

"I know this must be really weird for you. And it really does suck about your mum and all. But this is pretty weird for me too, y'know?" Anna said, chewing rhythmically.

Elsa's jaw tightened. "Oh I bet. It must be _awful,_ " Elsa said, words steeped in sarcasm.

Anna stopped chewing. "Oh yeah? My mum's going fucking crazy about this. That's all I've heard, all month. _I don't want that woman's daughter in my house!_ Blah, blah, blah. I'm sick of it. And of course, she and Dad don't think for _one_ second about me. How do you think I feel? All of a sudden, fifteen years in the dark, single child, and oh suddenly, hi honey, you have a sister. If your own fucking parents lie to you, how are you supposed to trust anyone?"

Elsa's attention drifted away. She watched the sky, jet plane chugging across the field of blue, blowing smoke rings.

"Could you show me my room now?" she said.

"Fine."

Elsa followed the backs of Anna's mary-janes, flopping as badly as flip-flops through the apartment. She'd no idea that apartments could be this _huge_.

"Did you know?" Anna asked, as they walked.

"Did I know what?"

"About me. And Dad."

"He used to come over every few months to give Mum her check," Elsa said. At this Anna paused, half-turning.

" _Every few months_?" she said, betrayal between her pinched brow. For the first time since she arrived, Elsa felt sorry for her. Her sister asked, "Do you know if they were... if they were still?"

"I don't know," Elsa said, pausing. "But I don't think so."

"Oh." A bit of relief. Anna continued, leading her down the landing stairs.

"I knew about you, too," Elsa admitted. "Dad talked about you a lot."

She saw Anna shake her head. "Man, I feel like I'm in some kind of TV drama..."

Elsa decided not to tell her about the pictures her mother kept. _See, Elsa, this is your little sister. Isn't she pretty?_

_Why doesn't she live here with us, Mama?_

When they talked about Anna though, her mother would always start to cry.

_Your father wouldn't let me keep her. He would have taken you too, if I'd let him. That's why the checks to keep getting smaller. To punish me. He's a cruel man, Elsa..._

Whereupon her mother would fret, and worry, and weep, until Elsa promised, promised promised she would never leave her. And her mother would embrace her hard, squeezing her so close it hurt.

_Promise me Elsa. Don't leave mummy alone. You're all I have left._

But, in the end, her mother was the one who left her. Standing by her grave stone, alone, listening to the minister's groaning voice, she'd thought she would never forgive her.

Elsa caught sight of her pale, skinny reflection in the glass window, lank blond ponytail with bangs falling over her face. _I hate this house,_ she thought.

"This is your room."

Anna opened a door and took her inside. Elsa wandered in, gazing around. Another fish bowl room. Huge and open-plan. The Arendelle family was really into the minimalist look.

She couldn't help but think though: _It feels lonely._

"I'm supposed to take you to the school office tomorrow to get your paperwork done, too," Anna said. Elsa looked back at her. She was leaning against the door frame fiddling with her plastic heart-shaped locket.

A lump in her throat. "Right."

"Hans always comes to pick me up, so you can hitch a ride with us. He's got an awesome jaguar. It's boss," Anna said.

"Hands?"

"Oh." For the first time, she saw Anna smile. What a change it made. Her eyes lit up like a child's. Her smile was soft honeycomb. "Ha-ns. It's like, Danish or something. He's my boyfriend. We only started going out like a week ago, but he's _so_ dreamy. You've got to meet him."

But Elsa felt distracted. She said, "Your school... what is it like?"

Anna shrugged. "Private academy. Best the money can buy. But it's the same old shit, really." And she asked, "Say, where'd you go to before?"

"I..." she sat down on the four-poster bed. It was very comfortable. "I didn't go to school before, actually."

"Wait, what? You mean, like never?"

"Never," said Elsa.

"So what, you were home-schooled?" Anna was looking at her in curiosity now.

"Well, not exactly. My mum taught me some things. And I read pretty much every book at the library."

"But wouldn't that get her into trouble?"

"It did. She nearly went to prison a couple of times. But she didn't care." _Just stay by mummy's side please Elsa. I couldn't bear it if you abandoned me too._

"Shit." Anna approached, and sat down heavily on the bed next to her. "I better show you around too, then. Does that mean you can't like... even do maths or anything?"

The small quirk of a smile. Elsa handed Anna her sketchbook. She opened it, and Elsa watched her sister's dawning confusion as she turned page after page of triangles, angles, construction, Elsa's working out in neat little scrawls. "Wait... this is geometry, isn't it? We studied this last term." She flipped another page, to a castle drawn out of immaculately labelled angles. "Do you... enjoy doing this?"

"I do. It's fun."

There was a logic in maths that was lacking in her life. Everything added up. Everything made sense. When she immersed herself in numbers Elsa found a sense of peace she remembered only from when she was very small.

What Anna thought of this was in the baffled shake of her head. She snapped the book shut and tossed it back to Elsa. "You're nuts."

Elsa looked at her long white fingers in silence. The boys from down her road, whenever she ventured out of the flat would yell that at her: _"Hey weirdo! Your mum's nuts! They should lock her away in the loony bin."_

A sound like a slap. She looked up at Anna from under her eyelashes, to see her sister face palming. "Omigod, I didn't mean it like that. This is so bad." Elsa looked at her quizzically. Anna took a deep breath. "Look, I'm sorry," she said.

"Don't worry. I know you didn't mean anything by it," said Elsa distantly.

"Not just about that. Everything. Look, I'm pissed at my dad and I'm taking it out on you. Ever since he told me about you I've been trying to come up with reasons to be mad at you." Like a train pulling out of the station, she began to pick up speed. "But you've done nothing wrong. In reality I'm just mad because he always acts like he's so busy all the time and ignores me and Mum and I used to make excuses for him and- and I'm rambling, aren't I?"

"A little," admitted Elsa.

"Damn, I'm awful..."

Anna's eyes moved back to Elsa's notebook in her lap. "Say, do you think you could teach me sometime?"

"What, geometry?" said Elsa.

"Yeah. Pretty sure it's going to be on the next test, but I didn't understand it at all." A wonky smile. "To be honest, I'm pretty clueless at maths."

"Alright." Elsa opened the book. Anna shuftied up close to her, ankles touching, as Elsa in her quiet calm voice began to explain.


	2. chocolate weetabix

Elsa had never felt so nervous before in her life. Flushed and feeling sick, she pushed her bangs out of her eyes and looked at herself in the mirror. All her life she'd seen girls wearing school uniforms, and she'd wondered what their lives must be like. Now, seeing herself in the neat blazer and pleated skirt, she felt as though she was looking at someone else.

Even in the extra small size, though, it was baggy on her. And she'd no idea how on earth you were supposed to tie a tie. Her previous attempts only knotted the thing up like a cat's cradle. She looked at the piece of material in her hand. What exactly was the _point_ of a tie, anyway?

The knock at the door startled her out of her skin. Her heart thudded in her chest. "Y-yes?" she said.

"Are you nearly ready yet Elsa?" It was her father's voice.

"Almost..." she said, looking at the knotted silky thing in desperation.

"Well come out and join us when you are. Gerda's got your breakfast ready."

 _Gerda?_ Who was Gerda? Her stepmother's name was _Idun_.

"Al-alright," she stammered, as she heard her father's footsteps retreating. But a new panic stirred in her heart. She'd yet to meet her stepmother. From what Anna said, she'd been so angry at Elsa moving in with them that she'd jetted off to spend the weekend sulking at some spa hotel place thing called _Rejuvenation Palace._ But late last night she'd heard doors slamming and an unfamiliar woman's voice.

Her hands fumbled the tie, which looked down now through cloudy eyes she saw she'd tied into another series of hopeless knots. A sob tried to force its way from her throat. It wasn't like she wanted to be here, either.

Elsa found herself sinking down into her bed, which she hadn't slept a wink on last night because it was so soft she'd felt like she was trying to sleep on a marshmallow.

 _I can't go out there. I just can't,_ she thought.

"Elsa?"

She started up. "Anna?"

The door opened without invitation. Anna stood there, her uniform customised with rainbow knee-length socks. Her pleated skirt, which on Elsa came to her knees, she'd rolled up and pinned with bobby pins so it reached mid-thigh. She wore the same, definitely not school standard, crushed down mary-janes, ruby red as Dorothy's. She looked at the mess Elsa had made of tying her tie, and she hid her giggle behind her hand.

"Omigod Elsa. Let me guess: you've never worn a tie before, have you?"

Silently, in humiliation, Elsa shook her head.

"Alright, just leave it to me. I'll show you," said Anna. And all of a sudden her sister was right up in her personal space, brow knotted in concentration as she worked out the mess Elsa had made. She was so close she could feel her warm breath on her neck. "Right, so you tie this bit first like this, right? And then you put this bit over this bit. Then you go through _this_ bit-" she paused, frowning. Elsa's stomach churned uneasily. "That's not right. Okay. So you go through _this_ bit- wait."

"Um," said Elsa.

"Okay so apparently this is a lot harder doing it this way round..." Anna said, scratching her head. And her eyes darted up from under her lashes. "Are you feeling alright? Your face is all red."

"I'm f-fine," Elsa said.

"Are you s-sure?" Anna replied, grinning. Elsa flushed a deeper red. Whenever she got nervous, it was like she lost control of her vocal cords. Words never came out right. And whenever people teased her for her stammer, it just made it worse.

"Sh-sh-shut-up," she said

"You sh-shut up," Anna said, smiling like it was a game. And Elsa saw red.

"Le-leave-me al-alone!" she yelled, shoving Anna away. "Get- get out!"

Anna's face fell. "Wait, what?" she said.

"I d-don't need you to-" she moved her mouth, but no sound came out. When it did, it came with a rush: "-to ma-make fun of me."

Anna looked shocked. "I wasn't trying to make fun of you... I was just teasing," she said.

"Tha-that's the exact s-same thing," said Elsa. She tried to stop the stammer. But as she knew all too well: the more she thought it about it, the worse it became.

Anna's hand went up to fiddle with her braid. "Geez. You're kind of overreacting."

"I'm n-not overreacting!" Elsa exclaimed.

"Girls?" their father stood in the doorway, looking between the two of them. They fell silent. "Your breakfast is getting cold, you know."

Silently, Elsa brushed past Anna and strode quickly out of the room.

In the breakfast room, the table was set immaculately with a lace white tablecloth and candelabra. Stood by the side with her hands folded across her blouse was an older woman. Elsa stopped dead. Her first thought: that this was her stepmother. And yet that didn't seem right.

"Miss Hall. I didn't know what you like for breakfast, so I cooked a traditional for you and there's continental as well. Or I could do you some toast if you'd prefer."

Elsa stood, flabbergasted. And the woman misunderstood her shock and smiled. "Forgive me. You must be wondering who I am. My name's Gerda. I'm housekeeper for the Andersons."

"Oh. I'm-"

"I know who you are, Miss Hall," Gerda said with a smile. "Please take a seat. What do you want to drink?"

"Um. Anything's fine..." she said

"If you tell her 'anything' Elsa, be warned that she's going to make you tea every time." It was her father. Looking smart in a dark suit, hair combed back, he sat down at the head of the table. He picked up the newspaper set at his place and with a wetted thumb set to perusing it.

"Tea's fine," said Elsa quickly. She relieved to hear the words leave her mouth all in order.

"At last. Someone in this house with good taste," said Gerda with warmth, vanishing into the kitchen.

Safely hidden behind the Daily Mail, Elsa stole a glance in her father's direction. What on earth was supposed to say to him? _They all lied to us_ ,the frontpage blared. _Bosses exposed as cheats by union._

When Anna slipped into the seat next to her, she cast her eyes down.

"Did you get all your homework done?" the man behind the paper asked.

" _Whatever,"_ said Anna.

Elsa stared at the pale parts of her fingernails. In the corner of her eye, she saw Anna scrawling something in a pocket sized notebook.

When Gerda returned, she set down a plate of bacon and eggs and toast in front of her. Their father apparently only drank coffee for breakfast, looking dark and black as tar, which quickly vanished behind the tabloid. Anna had chocolate weetabix.

"I wish I could tempt you with something more healthy, Anna dear," Gerda sighed, as she thumped down her chocolate milkshake.

"Don't care," said Anna, mouth stuffed with weetabix. Gerda shook her head.

Picking up her knife and fork, Elsa stared at the food for a long moment.

"What's wrong honey? Do you not like fried food?" Gerda asked. "That's why I offered you a choice, you know."

Elsa shook her head quickly. "Oh, no, no! It... it looks delicious. Thank you."

She was startled to find a warm hand pressed to her shoulder. "I think I'm going to enjoy having you with us, Miss Hall," Gerda said. "Nice to hear a _thank you_ for once," she said pointedly.

"Mmffthanks-gurrda," Anna said, with a mouth full of cereal.

Gerda made a noise of derision and headed towards the door. Anna looked at Elsa and shrugged, cereal on her cheek. Elsa quickly dropped her eyes to her food and started eating, cutting up her food into tiny bites. It really was delicious.

"Oh, Gerda. I was just looking for you. Have you seen my tylenol? I have the _worst_ headache." A stranger's voice. And Elsa turned in her seat to see a starlet.

Or at least, what she thought was a starlet. The woman wore a mauve bathrobe, her brown hair up in pink hair rollers, her face smeared with some kind of cream she was still in the process of rubbing in. Even then, she was beautiful. She looked like a creature from another world.

Her father put his paper down. "Honey, you're up early," he said.

Elsa saw her completely blank him and stride over to Anna and put her arms around her. She squeezed her tight.

"Geroff, Mum," Anna grumbled against the embrace, still stuffing her face with breakfast. "You're getting cream all over me."

"I take it you're still not talking to me, Idun," said their father.

Idun squeezed Anna tighter. "Anna, please tell your father for me I don't intend to speak to him for a year," she said lightly.

"You're being childish Idun," said their father.

"Anna, please tell your father that though I may be childish, at least I don't have affairs with other women. Or bring their bastard children into my house."

Elsa set down her knife and fork. She'd gone off her breakfast.

Anna shoved her mother off her with her elbow. "Go tell him yourself," she said, shovelling down the rest of her cereal. Without looking at her, she thrust a scrap of paper to Elsa across the table and continued eating.

Elsa picked it up. It was torn from Anna's notebook, written in purple gel pen.

 _Sorry,_ it said.


	3. ride

"Didn't I tell you? Sexy. As. Hell," said Anna with a low whistle.

Her boyfriend pulled up the open top jaguar onto the curb. It looked like something that should be in a car show. Long and sleek and red like a rocket, from another age, its cream interior spotless.

"Do you mean the car or your boyfriend?" asked Elsa.

"Heh. Good one," Anna said, clapping her on the arm before she wound her way round to the driver's door where Hans was cutting off the engine. He wore his uniform so well he looked like, instead of a schoolboy, a young businessman. His sideburns made Elsa smile though.

The second he opened his door and stepped out, Anna fell upon him. She threw her arms around his neck and planted a passionate kiss on his lips.

"Something tells me you missed me, Sunbeam," he said, when she pulled away.

"I don't know. What do you think?" she said, kissing him on the tip of his nose.

"I think you're a dork," he said playfully.

"You love me really though."

"You know I do." He swept her into a kiss. Anna dug her fingers into his hair.

Elsa checked her nails, embarrassed. How long did Anna say they'd been going out? A few weeks? She didn't know much about relationships, but she knew that watching this was making her feel the urge to dunk her head in the toilet.

"Say, Sunbeam, is this the sister you were telling me about?" Elsa started up to see Hans looking at her curiously. Anna broke away from him.

"Oh. Right, this is Elsa."

"Hi," Elsa said quickly. She squirmed under his gaze: something like embarrassment.

"Sunbeam, I can see why you never told me about her before," Hans said, with a rising devilish grin. "She's cute."

Elsa felt her face flush redder than the rising sun. And Anna took off one of her mary-janes and started whacking him with it.

"Worst. Boyfriend. Ever," she said.

Hans fended himself off from her shoe assault. "Kidding. I'm kidding," he said through laughter. "I just wanted to see your jealous side."

"Well you got it," Anna said, socking him in the face with the sole of her shoe. "Do you like it now?"

For such a small thing, she had some strength in her. Hans rubbed his red cheek. "I think maybe I do," he said, lowering his voice so that it was almost a suggestion.

"Weirdo!" Anna yelled, hitting him harder. "Elsa, what do you think? Should I dump him?"

Elsa felt so embarrassed it was all she could do to stare at her shoe laces.

"Um..."

"See what you've done now Hans? You're scaring away my new sister." Elsa heard a thump as she hit Hans again. Did she have to be so violent?

"Anna, what are you doing?" Elsa whipped round to see their father on the curb, Anna's bookbag in his hand.

"Oh, Dad." Anna quickly hid her shoe behind her back. "Nothing," she said.

"Mr Anderson," Hans said warmly, striding over to shake his hand. "Good to see you again."

"Likewise," said her father. "I apologise for my daughter's violence. She's always been an... energetic girl."

"Dad..." Anna groaned.

"I wouldn't have her any other way, Mr Anderson," said Hans. Her father made a doubtful noise.

"Well, Gerda's doing a roast on sunday if you'd like to join us for dinner. I'd be interested to hear more about that business venture you mentioned the other day."

" _Dad._ " The word was an aggravated stamp of the foot.

"Of course," Hans said eagerly. He was shaking hands her father's hand again.

"Five 'o clock, then?"

"You can count on it," said Hans.

Anna stalked towards her father and snatched the forgotten bookbag from his hands. She grabbed Hans by the crook of the arm.

"Come _on_ , Hans."

Hans let himself be led away. "See you sunday, Mr Anderson."

"Drive safe, now. You're looking after both of my daughters today."

Hans raised a hand in salute. "On my honour." He opened the door for her, and hastily Elsa clambered into the cramped back seat, setting her backpack down next to her on the cream leather.

"Hope your first day at school goes well, Elsa," said their father.

"Thanks," she said, without meeting his eyes.

They pulled away, joining the steady flow of city traffic. Anna was quiet. Sat diagonally behind her Elsa thought there was something about that looked tense. Her shoulders looked stiff.

Elsa wished for the hundredth time that she could go home. _I don't belong here. With these people,_ she thought.

"What do you think about the ride then, Elsa?" Hans asked, not looking away from the road.

"I'm wondering if everyone who goes to your school is this obscenely rich," she replied.

Hans laughed out loud. "I like your sister," he said to Anna.

"Also, I'm afraid I don't know a lot about cars," Elsa admitted.

"Well you don't need to to appreciate a sexy car like this. It's a Jaguar E-type. 1965."

"It's in good condition for such an old car." Elsa found herself struggling to find something to say.

"A _vintage_ car," he corrected her. "It wasn't always in such good condition. It needed a lot of renovation."

"Did you renovate it?" she asked.

"My older brother did," Hans admitted.

"You have a brother?"

"You could say that," he said. Anna made an amused noise. "Well, alright. I have thirteen."

Elsa leant forward, thinking she'd misheard him. " _Thirteen_ brothers?" she asked.

"I know, right?" he said. "And they're all older than me."

"You're the baby?"

Hans nodded. "I'm the baby. And boy, do they treat me like I am..." He glanced off the road to Anna. "You alright, Sunbeam? You're quieter than normal."

"Implying I'm normally loud?" Anna said.

"Not implying anything of that sort..." Hans said with a whistle.

" _Idiot_ ," she said.

Elsa started. She looked at her sister, arms crossed tightly, glaring to the side.

"Anna..." Hans groped blindly for her knee, giving it a squeeze.

She sighed, unfolding her arms. "It's fine. I'm fine." She smiled. It wasn't genuine. "Can we take the motorway?"

"For you, Sunbeam, sure."

The nickname was making Elsa want to throw up. She thought about asking, why S _unbeam_ , but stopped herself just in time. _It's probably because she's the 'light of his life.'_

Hans put his foot to the pedal and they flew down the slip road and joined the motorway. A lorry roared past them, deafening in the open top. Anna fiddled with the radio on the chrome dashboard, and the latest hit blared over the top of the din.

Anna raised her voice: "Drive faster."

The sun was rising over the fields, the gentle oranges brightening into brilliant reds: a blaze on the horizon. They were flying down the road.

"Don't slow down," said Anna. She leant over to her side and a second later as she stood Elsa realised she'd clicked off her seatbelt. Elsa gasped, Hans's head snapping to her violently.

"Anna, what do you think you're-" His words were drowned out as another lorry thundered past. Steadying herself on the dashboard, Anna straightened up. A honk blared behind them. Slowly, she let go of the dashboard and stood free, raising her hands above her. Her braids whipped wildly behind her, her eyes closed, head back, a worshipper receiving ecstatic vision.

Elsa couldn't breathe.

Grabbing her by the hand, Hans, violently, yanked her down. Clicking the indicator, he pulled over into the hard shoulder, slamming the car into a sharp stop and stalling.

He grasped both her wrists hard. "What the fuck is wrong with you?" he demanded. "You could have been killed!"

She tore her hands away from him. "Who are you to tell me what to do? You're not my father!" Her eyes were hard and hot: boiling igneous rocks.

"Do you _want_ to die?" he demanded.

"Don't you tell me what to do," she said. She opened the car door and got out, slamming it behind her.

"Where do you think you're going now" Hans called, as she stormed forward into the scrub land on the built-up roadside.

"Wherever I _want_ ," she yelled, marching off.

Hans sighed a deep sigh of aggravation and restarted the car.

"Should..." Elsa said weakly, "shouldn't we go after her?"

"Let her get lost in the middle of nowhere. Maybe it'll teach her a lesson," he said, slamming the car into gear.

"Has she done something like this before?"

"You could say something like that," said Hans, checking his wing mirror.

Elsa looked to the scrubland, but Anna had vanished. Hans pulled out and they drove the rest of the way to school in silence, Hans's manoeuvres terse and sudden.

Elsa couldn't get the image out of her head. The note on the radio stretching on for that one eternal moment. Anna, her flyaway hair in the breeze, raising her arms as though she was flying.

It cut her to the bone.


	4. bad girl

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N- Trigger warning for mentions of suicide.

Elsa sat in the empty classroom, a stack of test papers in front of her. Sunlight streamed in through the large windows. Raising her head wearily she glanced at the clock; it wasn't yet one 'o clock. She looked back down at the test paper, the multiple choice questions blurring into one. _Which is the correct chemical formula for hydrogen?_ Elsa crossed a box. She had a ¼ chance of getting it right, didn't she?

Hans had ran out on her as soon as he they pulled up in the car park. He was going to sign Anna in, he said. When she'd tried to call after his retreating back, _what do I do?_ the words jammed in her throat.

So she'd turned towards the school alone.

If you could call it a school. In the town where Elsa and her mother had lived, the secondary modern was a random collection buildings in various states of disrepair surrounded by a chain-link fence. Walking with her mother to the supermarket as a child, she'd always held onto her hand tighter as they passed by. To her, the school had always looked like some kind of prison, or zoo. The teenagers that yelled abuse at them and hurled coke cans as they went by seemed little better than wild animals.

In comparison, this school didn't even look like a school. If wasn't for the people hanging outside on the wall in uniform, she would have assumed it was a stately home. Fronted by a gravel circular driveway, roses wrapped round wooden trellises, mermaids lounged in fountain sat in the middle of the turning circle.

She probably would have spent the morning wandering around aimlessly, too shy to ask for help, fighting off tears, if the school secretary hadn't been waiting for her in the entrance hall.

She was dragged through a huge foyer with a glittering chandelier above her head, up the loop of a grand staircase, to the oak-cased school office, where she'd been asked to take a seat. The secretary set her up with her timetable, and proceeded to explain a great deal of things very quickly. For example: she was going to be a member of the Sixth Form, but she was also in a "vertical tutor group," called Brunel, which she'd take registration with.

"Form?" she asked, dizzied.

"Like a house," the secretary explained, and Elsa nodded in understanding, although she didn't understand at all.

There was also something called Enrichment, which sounded like a voluntary after school club, except it wasn't voluntary. Students could score merits for their form and this was a good thing. If you did extra well you received... a postcard? This was supposedly a good thing too. And she might have misheard, but Elsa was sure the secretary said misbehaviour sent you to somewhere called the _waffle_ room. This wasn't such a good thing. The secretary was half way through explaining prefects when Elsa couldn't stand it anymore.

"I'm sorry," she blurted out. "I don't know if you know or not, but this is my first time at a school. Ever."

She was surprised when the secretary smiled at her sympathetically. "We're aware of your situation, Miss Hall. We've had many students over the years who've come to us from home education. What we do is give you some tests to find out your level of ability and fit you into classes accordingly."

'Home education.' That was one way of putting it. Elsa had a horrifying vision of sitting in a class with eleven year olds.

 _But what does it matter?_ She thought. _There's no way I can fit in here anyway._

The secretary wrenched her from her depressing thoughts. "I believe you have a sister at this school. Anna Anderson?"

She started. "Yes."

"Then I'm sure Anna will give you a hand and, 'show you the ropes' as they say," the secretary said, chuckling to herself.

Elsa sat in the classroom, glancing back up at the clock. Had it stopped? It didn't seem to have moved since she'd last looked at it.

 _My sister?_ She thought to herself. _The one I met yesterday?_ Anna was no better than a stranger. The only thing that connected them, that they had any reason to interact at all, was because her father couldn't keep it in his pants around his secretarial assistant.

_I spent the last ten years living with Mum in a one-bed flat with a man from the council coming round every week to try and repossess us. When I grew out of my shoes, I cut holes in the fronts. And she, the 'legitimate' heir, hasn't wanted for anything in her life._

_How can I rely on someone like that?_

But to the smiling secretary Elsa had only said, "Okay."

* * *

At lunch time the bell rung and startled Elsa half to death. The school secretary returned and cheerily told her that she was welcome to eat in the refectory and meet some of the other students or go outside if she wished.

So Elsa ate the packed lunch Gerda made for her in the empty classroom, alone.

Outside the window, she watched a group of boys who'd discarded their blazers and were playing football. Elsa ate her sandwich in tiny bites; it was delicious.

Out in the corridor, she could hear a commotion.

" _Miss Anderson_. I've warned you a dozen times about your negligence to your uniform. Am I going to have to put you in isolation yet again?"

Elsa started. Did he say, _Miss Anderson_?

"Negligence? Use smaller words, Mr S. You know I suck at English," she heard Anna say. Elsa stood from her seat and moved closer to the door to hear better.

"As I've told you before Anna- if you only _applied_ yourself to your studies-"

The dry clip of her sister's voice: "Weren't you berating me about my _uniform_ , teach?"

A second of silence, and the aggravation of the teacher's voice: "I want you to put on your regulation shoes. And for goodness sake, sort out your skirt-"

"What's wrong with my skirt?"

"It's- well-" the teacher paused. Embarrassed, Elsa thought. "-It's too short, Anna. You're going to distract the male students from their work."

"Oh. So that's it," said Anna.

"I'm glad you understand." Relief in the teacher's voice.

"I'm sorry I've been distracting you, Mr Smith. I didn't realise," Anna said sincerely.

"Yes, I'm happy- what? No!" the teacher said, angry and flustered.

"See you later, Mr S. It's been a real laugh."

Footsteps, and Mr Smith's vanishing voice, "A-Anna! Come back here this instant."

When Elsa opened the door, the young teacher was stalking back in the other direction, red faced and embarrassed.

When he was gone, she saw Anna slip stealthfully from a side corridor, peering round. She was laughing to herself.

 _Anna_ , she tried to call, but she couldn't get the word out. And Anna nipped away down the corridor.

Elsa looked back at the empty classroom and her bookbag and her half eaten sandwich, and she closed the door. She hurried after her sister.

Anna was _fast_. She nipped down one corridor plastered with the faces of the candidates for the student council, and she zipped down another. When Elsa turned one corner, Anna turned another. She was a comet of red hair, vanishing.

Elsa found herself in a very different part of the school than the opulence she'd seen. She was standing in a dimly lit stairwell, with metal stairs that clanged under Anna's feet overhead. For a short while, she listened, and then the noise disappeared.

Elsa climbed the stairwell, running her hand along the rough stone wall. It was calloused and marked with graffiti scratched into the rock.

_CH & DL 4eva  
_

_Mr Roads sucks dick_

One bit of graffiti just read: _I love her._

Elsa ran her fingers over the stone, feeling the weight and memory of the words etched there. The stairwell was so different from the polished luxury of the rest of the school. Here it was raw, real.

Or maybe it just reminded her of home.

She was baffled when she reached the top of the stairwell, and they led nowhere. Anna couldn't, after all, have just vanished. Then she heard a _snick_ sound, like the sound of a dart in a bullseye. Elsa looked up and saw the trapdoor.

Pulling down the ladder she climbed up and looked around. Inside it was dark, her eyes slowing adjusting. Elsa wrinkled her nose: it smelled like smoke.

 _The clock tower,_ Elsa realised. This had to be inside the clock tower.

She felt something whizz past her, missing her face by inches. In shock her head snapped round: embedded in the wall were several throwing knives.

"Oh shit, sorry," said Anna. Elsa saw her now, sat up against the wall, lit by the red glow on the tip of her cigarette. "...Elsa?"

Elsa's eyes fixed on the cigarette in her hand, as Anna tapped the ash from it. Anna was smoking.

She's a _bad girl,_ she realised.

By her side were a bunch of throwing knives.

"Where did you even get those?" Elsa asked, climbing up off the ladder.

Anna shrugged, like it was nothing. "Got into the confiscation box, ages ago. Found some really interesting stuff in there."

"Like _knives_?"

"Like I said: interesting stuff," said Anna.

Elsa turned her attention to the wall. Her eyes adjusting to the dark now, she saw someone had drawn a chalk outline of a person. A man.

"Out of the way," said Anna.

"Huh?"

"I don't want to send you to the nurse's office on the first day, do I?"

Elsa stood back. _Snick._

"Bulleye."

The knife hit the outline in the middle of the chest, where the heart would be.

"Do you smoke?" asked Anna, as she took a drag. Elsa shook her head. "Just as well," she said, parting her lips so that when she exhaled, she exhaled a ring of smoke. "It's a dirty habit."

"So why do you smoke?" Elsa said.

"Maybe I'm a dirty person," said Anna. _Snick._ She asked: "Could you get them for me?"

"Them?"

She inclined her head to the knives. Elsa pulled them out of the wall, with a popping sound, and handed them back to Anna. Their hands touched.

"Thanks."

 _Snick._ Elsa sat down beside her sister, a foot or two away. "What you did in the car was really crazy," she said.

Anna grinned, like she'd just handed her a compliment. "You think so?"

"Hans was really mad."

"He'll be alright. His face was priceless, wasn't it?" Anna said.

"You like getting a reaction out of him?" It wasn't an accusation: just a question.

"Well it sounds bad when you put it _that_ way." _Snick_. Another shot in the heart. She laughed like a child. "Say," said Anna, "how'd your mum die?

Elsa shifted uncomfortably. What a thing to ask. No lead up: it was like Anna just turned round and put a knife in her chest. "She killed herself."

"Wow. Bogus." Anna learnt towards her and asked with a quiet, morbid curiosity: "How'd she do it?"

She felt the knife twisting. Elsa's fingers dug tightly around her knees. "Hung herself. From the beam in the kitchen. She asked me to go to the shop, and I... when I came b-back, I-" the words shuddered to a stop. She buried her face in her knees.

That night, she'd been taken down to the police station. They'd made her go over it again and again. She walked in, calling for her mother. I'm home. I'm back. She'd walked into the kitchen to put down the shopping bags. They hadn't made it that far; they'd slipped from her hands. The police made her tell it again. Are you sure that's how it happened? But Elsa's words kept slipping away from her. The more she chased them, the more they ran. Speak up, they said.

But what good had words ever done for her?

She didn't speak for a week, after that.

"Elsa, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you cry."

She felt a warm hand close over her own. The feeling of touch, comfort sent a shock wave through her.

"That was really moronic of me to ask you that. Geez." Her other hand was covering her face. "I keep fucking up, even when I'm not trying. Nothing like that has ever happened to me, so... I'm sorry Elsa."

But Elsa wasn't focusing on her words, only on the warmth of her hand. Nobody had ever held her hand but her mother. Elsa squeezed it back with an intensity akin to need.

"Elsa...?"

Elsa shook her head. She didn't want to say anything.

The sound of shuffling as Anna shuftied up next to her, and then she felt an arm around her waist, Anna pressing her face to her shoulder. Little by little, Elsa relaxed, and let herself be held.

"Can I tell you a secret? When I was little, I always wanted a sister," Anna said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N- If anyone can tell me what I'm paying homage to in the clock tower scene, you will officially win the internet.


	5. what sisters are for

Elsa laid on her stomach on her big, plush bed, absently working out a few equations in her book. Her eyes rambled towards her clock; it was a little past nine. Outside the huge glass windows it was dark.

Everything was so big here. She wasn't sure she was ever going to get used to it.

Elsa pushed herself up and climbed off over the bed, which sunk like a bog as she waded through it on her knees. She felt thirsty.

The door clicked as she opened it. She peered out, nervously. Nobody else seemed to be around, which was a relief. She pulled her door up behind her and padded down the corridor in the blue cosy pair of slippers she'd found at the foot of her bed. The nightdress, too, was new. When she'd dared to open her wardrobe on her first day here, she'd been astounded to find it full. The clothes were feminine, childish and expensive looking, in pastel shades of blue and pink. A few tops still had their price tags on and the amount of zeros she'd seen appalled her. No top, she thought, should have that amount of zeros. And while she'd picked out a few things she'd needed, when she got dressed in the morning it was invariably her own clothes she went for. They were old and unflattering, a mixture of charity shop bargains and hand-me-downs, but they were hers.

In this house where everything was huge and alien, they made her feel herself again.

As she passed by Anna's bedroom door she heard the canned laughter of an American sitcom show, and Anna's own guffaws of laughter. Down the hall her father's study door stood open. She paused. Her father was bathed in the blue light of the LCD screen, studying intently lines of numbers. He took a sip of coffee, not moving his eyes from the screen. Elsa moved away.

When she passed under the arch into the kitchen, Elsa started. There was a woman in the kitchen.

"Hello Elsa, honey. Want me to whip you up a snack?" asked Gerda, tucking away her cleaning cloth and wiping her hands. When she noticed Elsa's hesitation: "Are you alright sweetie?"

"I thought you were Idun," Elsa confided. She wasn't yet at all ready for another confrontation with her stepmother.

"Ah," said Gerda, as though she completely understood. A hand on Elsa's back, she led her forward to take a seat at the polished granite island counter. "Let me get you some supper. What would you like?"

"I already had pudding after dinner tonight," protested Elsa. They'd had rhubarb and custard and it'd been absolutely mouth-watering.

"Nothing better than one pudding than two," Gerda said with a wink. "I'll get you something chocolate. I'm starting to get the impression you like chocolate. Is that right?" Elsa couldn't help the smile that crept up onto her face. Gerda laughed aloud. "You and Anna are sisters alright, that's for sure."

Gerda whipped up a bowl of chocolate ice cream with chocolate sprinkles and a wafer. Elsa ate it into tiny, savouring bites. As she ate, she watched Gerda moving around the kitchen tidying. She gave off an air that she was very familiar with it.

"How are you getting on with school by the way Elsa?" Gerda asked, her back to her as she wiped down the surfaces.

"It's... different," Elsa said lamely.

"You're still adjusting?"

"I'm still adjusting," Elsa agreed.

"I can imagine it must be a shock."

Elsa nodded. "I just feel like... there are all these rules everyone knows about except me, and no one is bothering to tell me. Today in English class I needed the bathroom, so I stood up and tried to leave, and the teacher got mad at me and said I was supposed to ask for permission. How ridiculous is that?"

Most of the time, she felt as though she didn't have a clue what was going on. In English they were in the middle of reading a book. In chemistry class they were half way through the curriculum on balancing chemical formula. And for whatever reason known to man, she'd walked into biology to find they were supposed to spent the lesson cutting up eyeballs.

"Have you had any lessons you liked yet?" asked Gerda.

"Well..." said Elsa.

"Go on."

"Maths. My teacher said I was very good at it. That they're going to let me sit the A-Level for it." It'd been the first time she'd received praise like that. It'd felt good.

"That's really great Elsa," Gerda said warmly. She was cleaning food that was past its sell-by date from the fridge.

Elsa swallowed down her ice cream. "Can I ask you something Gerda?"

"Questions don't cost a thing, honey."

"How long have you worked for the Andersons?" she asked.

"Oh, a long, long time. I don't rightly want to count the years. When I first started Anna was just a little thing."

"Oh." _Then she probably doesn't know,_ Elsa thought. She wanted to ask Gerda: _did you ever meet my mother?_ But she didn't have the words. Instead she asked, "What does my father do?" Father. A clunky word. The only people who called their fathers, _father_ , were girls from old romance novels. Yet she couldn't imagine calling this man _dad_.

Gerda paused in what she was doing. "You don't know?" she asked.

"I know he has a company," Elsa said. "That's about it."

"Arendelle International," said Gerda. "He's the CEO. You ought to ask him about it, you know. I'm sure he'd be happy you asked."

Elsa bit her lip, poking at her ice cream with her spoon.

"He's been grooming Anna for a position in the company for years. Originally, he intended her to take over as CEO when he retires, but..." she trailed away.

She could have choked on her ice cream. " _Anna_?" Elsa asked. The same Anna who wore her skirts too short, skipped lessons and smoked?

"She's a smart girl. She has the intelligence for it. But... there was a lot of pressure on her." Gerda dropped her voice. "I know how she must seem to you, but you have to understand she's not had it easy the last few years."

"Money can't buy happiness?" Elsa said, one eyebrow raised.

Gerda quirked a grin. "If my years with this family have taught me anything, it's definitely be that."

"What happened to her?" Elsa asked.

"You'll have to talk to Anna. I'd like to tell you, but..."

"I understand." It wasn't worth your job to talk ill of your employers. And Elsa of all people understood how vital a job could be.

She was surprised when Gerda put her hand on her head and playfully mussed up her hair. "You know," she said, "I think you might possibly be the sweetest thing ever Elsa."

Elsa could feel her face turning bright pink. "I..."

"You don't need to say anything. I'm just glad you're here. I think you can help Anna."

"Me?"

"I think a big sister's guidance is just what she needs," said Gerda.

"I- I'm not sure..." How could she help Anna when she couldn't even help herself?

"Just be there for her. And she'll be there for you. That's what sisters are for."

"I... I guess I'll give it a try," said Elsa.

Gerda untied her apron and hung it on the peg. She gave Elsa's shoulder a squeeze. "That's all any of us can do. Turn the light off when you're done, will you?"

"Okay." Gerda picked up her handbag. A minute later, Elsa heard the front door click close.

Elsa ate her ice cream. A big sister? Well, why not.


	6. passing notes

"-What you have to remember of course is the historical context behind the novel. In the time Hardy was writing, the class divide was far wider than in our modern society. So that Angel, a middle class young man with a good upbringing would want to marry a mere milk maid would be-"

Elsa tapped her pen on the table impatiently. Beside her, her desk mate was texting on her phone, shielded by her copy of _Tess of the D'Urbervilles_.

She wasn't sure there was anything much more painful than reading along with her class at this speed. Which was: slower than a sloth on a warm day, with Mr Smith pausing every other sentence to de-construct some metaphor or discuss the "real meaning" hidden in the text.

Elsa just wanted to read the darn thing. Her fingers itched to turn to the next page so she could find out what would happen to Tess next. It was no wonder so many people hated reading if _this_ was how they read books.

Mr Smith rambled on, and Elsa's attention drifted away like a soap bubble. Her eyes rose from the book up two desks in front of her. Sat with a bleach blonde, her legs propped up on the desk, Anna was colouring her nails with felt-tip pen.

Because taking her English and maths GCSE was one of the requirements to entry to the Sixth Form, Elsa, by a quirk of coincidence, shared this class with her younger sister.

The teacher strode down between the desks, and tapped the space by Anna's feet with his laser pointer. "Feet off the desk, Anna."

Anna waited until she'd finished colouring her thumbnail bright red before she raised her eyes to meet Mr Smith.

"The desk. Feet off," he said, arms crossed.

Slow and laborious, with an air of insolence, Anna took her feet off the desk. "Better?" she asked.

"If you're so bored, Anna, you're more than welcome to read," he said.

"No way," she said. Her tone didn't offer much room for argument.

He thumped a copy of the book down onto the desk. "Then you can at least, _listen_."

"These and other words were nothing but the per- perfunctory babble of the surface while the depths remained paralysed," came the bored stiff reading voice of a boy at the front. "He turned away, and bent over a chair. Tess followed him to the middle of the room where he was, and stood there staring at him with eyes that did not weep-"

Elsa sunk back into her stupor. The girl beside her continued texting. She was daydreaming about Tess when the paper airplane hit her on the crown of the head.

She started up, and picking up the airplane stared around the room. Anna looked over her shoulder and grinned at her. She nudged her head at the plane.

Glancing up to check Mr Smith was distracted with some diatribe about gender roles in the 1800s, Elsa turned over the airplane. Anna had decorated it with little felt-tip flowers. She'd written: **Elllllssssaaa, I'm soooooooooo bored. do u want to come to the shops with me after skl?**

Elsa bit her lip. She'd been intending to spend this evening much the same as she had all week: curled up in her duvet with her door closed and no contact with anyone.

Only now did she understand the extent of the isolation during the years she'd spent with her mother. Being with other people, for six hours a day no less, was positively exhausting. When she finished school for the day the only thing she wanted was peace and quiet. Time to recharge her batteries. Time alone with her own thoughts.

 _I kind of want to read the rest of Tess of the D'Urbervilles tonight, too..._ she thought.

Picking up the airplane, she added her note on the bottom of Anna's: **I don't know. I've got a lot of homework.**

She glanced anxiously up at Mr Smith, who was still distracted, and sent the paper airplane flying back in Anna's direction. The teacher moved back to their side of the classroom, and Elsa started and quickly vanished behind her copy of the book.

"O Tess, forgiveness does not apply to the case! You were one person; now you are another. My God- how can forgiveness meet such a grotesque pres- presti-" the girl reading Angel's part hesitated, glancing up to Mr Smith.

"Prestidigitation," he said.

The airplane hit her on the shoulder. **U know u want to come. i will buy u cake. :-)**

Elsa hesitated. She wrote her note and sent the plane back. **What kind of cake?** she wrote.

The plane skidded back on the landing strip of her desk. Anna had wrote: **CHOCOLATE!**

 **Okay,** Elsa wrote. She threw the paper airplane. However, to her mounting horror, she got the angle wrong. It arched over Anna, soaring over the desks to hit the whiteboard nose first and divebomb to the floor.

"Right. Who threw that?" demanded Mr Smith. Elsa sunk further behind her book, reddening.

"Sir! It was Anna and her new sister sir!" said a boy in the front. She saw Anna glaring at him fiercely for dobbing them in.

Mr Smith picked up the crumpled paper airplane and read what they had written. "As important as arranging your social life is, this is neither the time nor the place." He strode down towards Elsa, the crumpled thing in his hand. "I really expected better of you Elsa. Especially since you're in the Sixth Form. I really hope your sister isn't going to be a bad influence on you."

Elsa shook her head dumbly, flushed and humiliated. She felt the all the eyes in the room on her and she shrivelled inside.

"Since I see you're distracted, you can take over the part of Tess from Emma," he said.

"Read?" she squeaked.

"The top of page 293 please, Elsa."

Her heart was pounding in her chest. "I- I'm not great at reading aloud."

"You'll do fine, Elsa," said Mr Smith, in what she supposed was supposed to sound a soothing voice.

She didn't feel soothed. She felt like her heart was going to jump out of her chest. There was no way she could read aloud. Not with all these people listening.

"You can start Elsa," Mr Smith said, not too subtly.

With shaking fingers, she turned her eyes down to the page. The text seemed to wobble.

"I thought, Angel, that you l-loved me," she read, wincing as her stutter made itself known. She tried to hold it back: as always, it only made it worse. "-me, my very s-self. If it is I you do- do love, O how c-ca- can it be that y-you loo—look-" her fingers trembled harder. She could feel the tears welling in her eyes, hot and heavy. Her vision began to blur. "-and s-speak s—so? It fri- frightens me. H-having be... begun to l-love y-y-you, I-" _I love you forever_ , she tried to say, but the words lodged in her throat. She tried to speak again, but nothing would come out. Tears divided the page like a kaleidoscope.

Then somebody else began to read. They read in a clear, perfect reading voice: "I love you forever- in all changes, in all disgraces, because you are yourself. I ask no more. Then how can you, O my husband, stop loving me?"

Elsa raised her head from the page, smothering the tears with the palms of her hands. It was Anna who'd spoken. She'd taken her feet from the desk: her inflection was clean and perfect. A good number of students, and Mr Smith, were staring at her.

He shook his head in disbelief. "Well, don't stop there. Please, go on Anna."

Anna read on for the rest of the chapter. All attention had effectively transmuted itself from her poor performance to her sister. When the bell rung, Anna swung round in her seat to beam at Elsa.

She couldn't help but smile right back.


	7. skating babies on jelly skates

A heatwave- that's what the weatherman predicted. Smiled his perfectly bleached incisors and said, "It's going to be hot as hell!"

In the fish-bowl of the apartment, Elsa felt like an insect under the magnifying glass. Sat at the kitchen counter poring over her English homework, she gnawed on the end of her pencil, unsticking her t-shirt from her gummy skin.

"It's no good. I can't concentrate," she said, slumping against the counter, forehead pressed to the cool granite work surface.

The voice from below agreed. "It's. Too. Damn. Hot," her sister said.

Elsa pushed herself up on her sticky palms to look at her. The fridge sat wide open and Anna had propped herself against it, head lolled back by the pro-biotic yoghurt and a custard trifle.

"Isn't that wasting electricity?" Elsa said.

Anna opened her eyes and raised an eyebrow at Elsa. _Right,_ Elsa remembered.

She watched as Anna languidly pushed herself up, twisting round to grab something off the shelf. "Here. Catch."

The coke can sailed through Elsa's open hands and hit her in the chest. She fumbled to catch it before it could roll off her lap. Anna threw her head back laughing, and knocked the trifle off the shelf. _Splat_! It made a huge custardy mess all over the floor and sprayed up the side of the fridge door.

"Crap," said Anna.

Elsa covered the sound with her hand, but it slipped through her fingers: she started giggling and she couldn't stop.

"Hey! It's not funny," said Anna, before she noticed she noticed the custard sprayed up her leg. "Okay. Maybe it is." With one finger, she tried a bit. "Not bad," she said in approval.

Elsa slipped from the stool with the horrible feeling of bare skin sticking and peeling from the metal seat. She grabbed a whole wadge of kitchen roll from the counter. "Let me help."

"Thanks."

For some minutes now, Elsa could hear the dull murmur of voices down the hall from the study. As she got down on her knees and handed Anna the kitchen roll, the murmur became a rumble.

"-I've already told you. You are not leaving for Canada next week-" Idun's voice split through the grey sound. Opposite her, wiping the custard off the fridge, Anna flinched.

Elsa heard her father say something in reply, more calmly, his words background television noise.

"-I don't care if it's a business thing. You only went away a fortnight ago. You're a selfish man! How can you leave everything to me?"

She couldn't catch her father's reply, just the word _Gerda_.

"And do you expect Gerda to raise our daughter, too?" Idun's voice rose. " _What about Anna?_ "

Her sister stood abruptly. She made her start when she kicked the fridge door closed. The commotion was clear to see in her body: the way she raked her hair back; the curl of her fingers; the relentless agitating of her foot. "C'mon, Elsa. Let's go out."

Elsa put down the kitchen roll. "Where?"

"- you always pretend that you're the good guy. That I'm the one causing trouble. But-"

The excited jiggle of her knee. "Don't know. Shopping," she said.

"-let me tell you something. You are _not_ the good guy-"

"Okay," Elsa said quickly.

* * *

On the underground, it was sweltering. Jammed between Anna and a man with a guitar case jabbing into her sides, she clung on to the handhold. The cold coke can, wet with condensation, she pressed against her clammy neck.

The wind that gusted through the tunnels to the escalator was warm; stagnant. On sizzling tarmac they pounded the pavements; an old piece of gum, melted to play-dough, attached itself to the bottom of Elsa's shoe.

Inside the shopping centre, however, it was blissfully cool.

" _Air conditioning,_ " Anna breathed.

The shops her sister wanted to look in were the kind Elsa would never have even set foot in. Clean; sleek; an shop assistant waiting to greet them with crisp blouse and neatly clasped hands.

"Is there anything in particular you're looking for today Ma'am?" she asked Elsa, Anna barrelling off inside. Elsa looked after her helplessly.

"Um, we're fine. Thank you," she mumbled at her feet, sure she could feel the elegant woman looking at her disparagingly. She hurried off after Anna.

She was holding out a t-shirt. As Elsa approached, she spun towards her. "Hey, you should try this one on Elsa. I bet it'd look cute on you."

Elsa picked up the dangling price tag, her eyes widening. "I'll pass," she said, letting it drop.

" _Elsa._ " Anna was giving her that look again. From her purse she whipped out a piece of plastic and waved it around. "We've got _American Express_."

 _Just because you've got money doesn't mean you have to spend it though,_ she thought.

"C'mon. Just try it on," Anna said.

She shook her head. "I like my clothes," she said, tugging at her favourite t-shirt. Her mum bought it for her a few years ago from Oxfam. It was blue and had a picture of the cookie monster. It was faded now from the amount of times it'd gone through the wash, and there was a hole under her armpit, but apart from that there was nothing wrong with it.

Anna gave her a look that said, "Really?" and Elsa stared hard at her shoelaces.

 _Way to make yourself look like a total dork, Elsa,_ she berated herself. _I don't belong here. I ought to just go home._

Except that, the home she was thinking of didn't exist any more.

"Elsa! Come look at this one!" Elsa started. Stood by another rail, Anna was holding a dress to herself. "What do you think?" she asked.

They spent almost an hour in the shop, Anna throwing half their stock over her arm to try on. Elsa didn't mind so much. She sat on the cool seat opposite the changing rooms, appreciating the air conditioning. The shop assistant ran around grabbing different sizes for Anna. Whoosh! The curtains flew open and Anna appeared, posed on one upheld sultry leg, draped in a red figure hugging dress that showcased her petite frame. "What do you think?" she said, pivoting on her kitten heels to give Elsa a twirl, sequins flashing.

"Will you be allowed to wear that?" Elsa asked.

"I don't see who's going to stop me," she replied. "Though... now we just need to get invited to a party so I canwear it."

When she'd finally done the shop assistant scanned through the huge pile of clothes and Anna whipped out her credit card.

They didn't stop there, however. At the next store Anna spent almost eight hundred pounds on shoes. Eight hundred pounds! Two months rent for her and her mother. On shoes.

Despite being weighed down like a packhorse, bags hanging off every spare finger, there was a spring in Anna's step. She chewed gum rhythmically. She hopped up onto the wall bordering the pavement and walked it like a tight-rope. She laughed aloud. All Elsa could think was: _What a waste._ If her sister noticed her quiet demeanour, however, she didn't show it. The more shops they visited, the more flashes of her American Express card, the bigger bounce in her step. Her eyes shined. Her cheeks were flushed. Later, they stopped and bought nasty, sugary coffee for four pounds a cup. Ate powdered doughnuts that left them with sticky fingers. In the jewellers, Anna made the assistant take out almost every single bracelet behind the glass cabinet and then decided she didn't like any of them. She played leapfrog over the bollards and broke a real corral necklace she'd bought just minutes before.

And Elsa felt like she wasn't really there. She could feel her legs moving, feel the sweat pooling at her neck, the stone rattling in her shoe. And at the same time: she wasn't really there at all.

The two of them took a brief respite on a bench outside the shopping centre, in full sun, so Anna could rub her reddening feet, sore already from wearing her sharp new heels. A sea of shopping bags surrounded them. And Elsa suddenly realised that Anna wasn't smiling any more.

The manic shine from her eyes had dimmed. She sat with her her ankle crossed over her leg, foot cupped in her palm, staring out. She seemed to be looking very far way.

Elsa spoke softly: "Shall we go home now?"

Anna didn't say anything; just shook her head.

Wiping the sheen from her brow, Elsa looked up across the street to see the entrance to the twelve screen multiplex. "I bet it'd be nice and cool in the cinema," she said.

"What did you want to see?"

"I don't know. I don't know what's out right now."

How many years had it been since she last went to the cinema? At her enthusiasm, the smile returned to Anna's face. "Yeah, let's go see something! I heard the new movie is out with that actress. You know, the blond one, who wears her hair like _this_. Y'know, from that film with the alien killer ants..."

In the cinema, after finding a film they both liked the sound of, Anna thrust a handful of crisp notes into her hand and ran to the bathroom. "Get our tickets, Elsa!"

Elsa pulled at the loose hem of her shirt. _Tickets... right._

How exactly _did_ you buy a cinema ticket?

She had vague memories with her mother, but that had been a long time ago. Elsa hesitated, and joined the line at the kiosk, craning close to the couple of front of her. "Hey, two student tickets for the Planet of the Apes film. Cheers," she heard the boy say.

Sweat broke out on her brow. _What kind of tickets do we need? Student tickets? Or is that just for university students? Are we classified as children still?_

"Can I help you?"

She started. The couple had moved on and the girl behind the counter was staring at her. She raked her hand through her hair, fingers snagging on a knot. "He-hey. Um, two student tickets for How to Dragon your Train- I mean- how to Train your Dragon 2. Please."

"Have you got your student union card?"

She felt all the heat in her body rise to her face. "Um- I-"

"I'm afraid I'll have to put you down as adults if you don't have your ID," the girl said.

Relief flooded Elsa like ice cold water. "Fine," she gasped. "I mean- that's fine."

The girl gave her an odd look. "That'll be sixteen fifty all together then please."

"R-right." Fumbling the wad of crumpled notes Anna gave her, she somehow even managed to drop one. "Sorry!" She tried to unfold a crinkly five pound note, but her fingers were trembling too hard. She felt the girl's eyes on her, no doubt wondering what was wrong with her. A boy behind her laughed aloud, and giving up on the exact change, she slammed a twenty note down on the counter.

She was so ashamed and embarrassed she couldn't even meet the girl's eyes as she gave her her change and printed out their tickets.

"You're in screen seven. Enjoy the movie," the girl said. Elsa heard it as though from underwater.

"Th-thanks," she mumbled. By the time she stumbled blindly back into Anna, who was clutching a bag of popcorn and grinning, Elsa was pushing back tears.

_What's wrong with me?_

"Hope you don't mind salted. Did you get the- hey... what's up?"

Elsa furiously wiped the tears away with the backs of her hands. "Nothing."

"Well it can't have been nothing if you're crying. C'mon. What happened?" Gently, she touched her arm. Elsa fought off the base instinct not to flinch away.

 _Everyone here thinks I'm a total weirdo now, that's all,_ she thought.

"Was someone a jerk to you? Tell me and I'll destroy them for you." To demonstrate, she drove her fist into her palm with a satisfying _smack._

No one had ever offered to destroy someone for her before. It was surprisingly comforting.

She released a small hiccup of laughter. "It's fine. I'm f-fine." To Anna's raised eyebrow of disbelief, she lied, "Really! I was just... being an idiot, that's all. Can we go see the movie now? Please?"

"You're _sure_ you're okay?"

She was sure she wanted out of this cripplingly embarrassing situation. "Yeah."

"Alright then..."

They made it inside their screening just as the trailers started. Inside, it was cool and dark, the screen just under half full. All around them she could hear the rustle of popcorn and crisps. When the lights dimmed, she turned round to watch the faces in the dark.

The movie was a good one, and by the end she'd gotten completely involved in the story; her tense shoulders relaxed and she forgot about what happened earlier. When the credits rolled, she felt like she was snapping out of a trance.

"That was great!" she said. Anna nodded animatedly.

"Hey, Elsa..."

"Yeah?"

Elsa noticed something strange in her eyes. Anna played with the end of one of her braids.

"Do you think maybe... we could see another one?" Her eyes conveyed what she couldn't say in words: _I don't want to go home. Not yet._

"Sure..." said Elsa.

The next movie was terrible. In the best possible way. Clearly everybody else had got the memo, because the screen was completely empty apart from the two of them. There was a liberating feeling about having a whole screen to yourself. Laps full of bags of m&m's and skittles from the concession stand, they munched handfuls of minstrels, fingers bumping against one another in the bag, laughing aloud.

Anna threw a handful of rainbow m&m's. They hit the screen with the sound of pebbles down a quarry. "You suck! Why did you make this movie?" she called.

"Is that a good idea?" asked Elsa, twisting round to peer at the little hole where the projection came through.

"It's just you and me here, right?" said Anna, before she bellowed, "SO WE CAN DO WHATEVER WE WANT!"

Elsa couldn't help it. She laughed, smothering the sound under her hand.

"Now you try," said Anna.

" _Me_?"

"Yeah. Yell something. As loud as you can."

Elsa hesitated. "Like what?"

"Like CHEESE CRACKERS IN ALMOND PASTE, or whatever. Whatever you feel like."

"I don't think I-"

"Don't _think_. Just yell," said Anna.

"But what for?"

"Geez. You ask so many questions. But y'know Elsa, there comes a time in life when you gotta stop asking questions and start shouting in the cinema about LIVE LOBSTERS IN BRINE SAUCE AND SEVEN BLIND MICE!"

She laughed. "You're crazy." And then: "Just yell about anything?"

"Yeah. Just fucking let it go."

Elsa hesitated a second longer, and then took a deep breath. "RICE CRISPY CAKES!" she yelled, feeling ridiculous. Anna nodded at her approvingly. Encouraged, she shouted, "JELLY BABIES! NUNS ON ROLLER SKATES!

Wow. This did feel good.

"JELLY NUNS ON BABY SKATES!" shouted Anna.

"SKATING BABIES ON JELLY SKATES!"

"Jelly skates?" laughed Anna. "How would you skate on jelly skates? You'd just wobble off."

"These are skating _babies_ ," said Elsa, raising a pointed eyebrow. "If they're talented enough to learn how to skate, jelly skates will be a cinch for them."

Elsa looked at Anna; Anna looked at Elsa. The both of them burst into hysterics. Her sister buried her face in Elsa's shoulder, body racked with laughter.

When the laughter stopped, she let her head lay there a little longer. "Say, Elsa..." she said, after a long time passed, "why do things have to be the way they are?"

She wished she knew the answer to that question, too.

By the time they left the cinema, it was almost sunset. The heat of the day had begun to recede and everything was bathed a golden-yellow. They walked out, squinting against the light.

Their eyes had adjusted to the dark.


	8. the storm

Elsa woke without knowing why. It was only when the second clap of thunder exploded that she understood.

A familiar tremor of excitement ran through her. Pulling off the covers she slipped out of bed and padded her way down the corridor.

The study door stood open, spilling out a blue crack of LED light over the polished wood floor. Even at this hour, her father was at his usual seat, eyes fixed on the glow of the screen. She heard the murmur of his voice as he spoke into the headset: "Yes, I understand... I need to speak from Jansson from resources tomorrow. Now, I'd like your opinion about..."

When the next thundercrack hit, he didn't even stir, except to take another sip of his coffee.

She moved into the living room, and her eyes widened at the sight she saw. The wall to wall glass windows provided a perfect panoramic view of the skyline, lit up for an instant as lightning crackled across the night sky.

It made her think of another night, long ago.

* * *

"Elsa... Elsa."

A drowsy fist rubbing the sleep from her eyes, Elsa stirred. "...Mum?"

Lit from behind from the landing light, she saw her mother's face, not far from her own. It was dark, and definitely past her bedtime. She pushed herself up from the mattress with a hand, gripping her stuffed doll anxiously. "What is it? Is that man back again?"

Her mother looked startled. "No, no... it's-"

As though in reply, a peal of thunder crackled like drumfire.

"A storm!" Elsa gasped. She leapt from her bed, clasping her duvet round her neck like a superhero's cape and ran outside.

Their tiny box-garden was lit up as the sky came alive with lightning, the thunder a deafening, marvellous roar in her ears. It sounded like the sky was angry.

"It's close by," said her mother, wrapping her dressing gown around her as she joined her in the garden.

"How can you tell?"

"You count the seconds between the lightning and thunder. Every five seconds is a mile. So it's..." As she spoke, there was a flash of light. She begun to count: "One... two... three... four... five... six... seven... eight... nine... ten... eleven..." A deafening rumble followed. "Just over two miles away."

"Is that because light travels faster than sound?"

"That's right. Where did you learn that Elsa?"

She slipped her into the softness of her mother's. "A book at the library."

"You're a smart girl. Ah, now, look!"

"One... two... three...four...five...six...seven...eight..." Elsa counted, before she was drowned out by the rumble. "A mile and a bit! It's getting closer, Mum!"

They counted together: "One...two...three...four...five..."

"One...two...three..."

"One... two..."

And then, as lightning zigzagged across the sky, before she could even start counting, a cannonade of thunder hit: the loudest yet.

"It's right overhead!" she yelled. The excitement of the storm was inside her, electricity sparking through her veins.

There was a deafening boom. Thunder crashing, the lightning struck just yards away from them. It hit the electric pylon behind the Patels' garden; blue sparks leaping and dividing down it before they dove into the earth. Elsa's ears rang. And it was over.

One by one, in quick succession, all of the lights went out. From down the road, an alarm went off, warbling a single repeated note into the night. Elsa and her mother stood together in the dark, hands connected like a string. She'd just witnessed something incredible.

Her mother squeezed her fingers. "Elsa, look up."

She looked up and gasped. "There are so many stars!"

Between the fast moving clouds, the sky was a black canvas, pinned with diamonds.

She'd never seen so many stars before.

"It's called light pollution." Her mother's face, shaded in the dark. "When lots of people live close together and turn on lots of lights. It means you can't see the stars very well anymore."

She thought she could hear a strange tremor in her voice. "Mum?"

"Have you read about that, in your books before?"

"No. But I read a book about the atmosphere. And light particles. They're made of rainbows."

She felt her mother plant a soft kiss on her head. "I don't know how I got so lucky to have a girl like you, Elsa. When you grow up, the world's going to be yours. You're going to be able to do anything you want."

But she didn't want the world. Squeezing her mother's hand she said, "I want to stay here with you."

* * *

Separated from the world by a pane of glass, Elsa watched lightning flash in the night sky.

Here, in this city, the light pollution was even worse than at home. The edges of the horizon were clogged with ugly yellow light.

" _-and you can't see the stars very well any more."_

Elsa stuffed her fist into her mouth to choke down the sobs. They racked her body with the force of small mines. But her father was down the hall and she didn't want him to hear; pressing her forehead to the glass, she cried silently.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I wrote this chapter, it actually started thundering. I decided to take it as a sign, from the gods. A sign that I should write more Frozen fanfiction.


	9. division

As Elsa padded towards the kitchen for a drink, nose in a book, she heard voices.

"Anna darling, would you help me lay the table?"

Elsa paused. It was Idun's voice.

Anna responded to the question with a loud groan. Elsa peeled her eyes away from her book to peer round the archway that divided the living room and kitchen. She saw Anna sat slouched at the counter, texting.

"Can't Gerda do it?" she said.

"It's her day off."

There was more than a smidge of nervousness in Anna's voice: "So... _you're_ cooking?"

A knuckle driven into her hip, Idun waved a ladle. "Are you implying my cooking is bad, young lady?"

"No... no," Anna said quickly. Before she added: "...I mean, you can use your beef stroganoff as a door wedge. So that's something."

Anna devolved into snickers. Idun sniffed. " _Young lady_ -" she begun.

But it was then she noticed Elsa standing under the archway. For a brief second, their eyes met. And then Idun set her back to her.

Apparently, her stepmother planned to deal with her by just ignoring Elsa all her life.

"Anna, please set the table," she set, taking a knife from the holder to slice up an aubergine.

"Let me just finish this tex-"

Chop. _Chop_. The end of the aubergine cartwheeled across the counter. " _Now,_ Anna."

"Geez, alright. I said I'd do it."

Sulkily, she slipped from the stool and with an exaggerated slouch mooched to the cutlery draw. In the sloppiest way possible she laid the table, slamming the knives and forks down untidily on the place-mats.

" _Nicely_ , Anna," Idun snapped.

"Alright, alright..." Anna grumbled, mumbling something under her breath about her mother and it being that time of the month.

Elsa's book slipped from her hand and _thunked_ against the carpet. As she leant down to grab it, Anna called, "Oh hey, Elsa!" waving a handful of spoons at her.

"Oh, um, hi." She hugged her book to herself. Nudged her head towards the extra places set at the table. "Is something special happening tonight?"

Anna brightened. "Hans is coming over for dinner. Punzie too."

"Punzie?" she asked.

"Right. Sorry, I forget you don't know this stuff. She's my cousin. Oh, and hey, I guess she's your cousin too."

Elsa hadn't thought about that before, but in retrospect it should have been obvious. She'd for so long lived just with her mother. Now, with her new family she realised: she must have aunts, uncles, cousins. Maybe even _grandparents_.

"What's up? You've got a weird look on your face."

"I've just realised," she said. "I have _relatives_."

Anna laughed aloud. "Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

She glanced over at Idun. Her stepmother's still had her back to her. _Chop. Chop. Chop._

"I guess I'll find out," she said.

* * *

Just after six, the bell rang. Elsa was in her room reading when she heard a tornado fly down the corridor. She poked her head round the corridor to see Anna pelting it to the front door. She yelled, "I've got it!"

Curiously, Elsa came out of her room. Though she still hung back in the living room out of shyness as Anna threw open the door.

Stood there was a girl about Anna's age with the longest blond hair she'd seen in her life. It was so long that if she hadn't braided it, she suspected it would probably drag along the floor.

"Oh, it's just you," Anna said.

The girl put her hands on her hips and raised her head in derision. But in a cute purple pastel crop top and knee length socks, she didn't inspire a lot of fear.

"Let me guess. Waiting for your _boyfriend_?" she said.

"May-be," said Anna.

"Well, since it's _just me_ , I'll _just go_ then." Pivoting on her heel, she strode out of the door.

"Wait, you moron! Rapunzel! I was kidding. Kidding!" Anna dove after her out the door, and after a brief apparent wrestling session, dragged her in by the crook of her arm. "Come _on_ , you loser."

Idun's voice came from inside the kitchen: "Anna! Are you insulting your cousin again?"

"She _knows_ I do it out of love, Mum..."

But Rapunzel crossed her arms and pursed her lips, turning away with a mock sob. "I don't know. I'm not convinced you love me any more, Anna..."

In the deep voice of a male love interest from the movies, Anna implored, "Punzie, babycakes..."

"What do you need a boyfriend for, anyway? _I_ could be your boyfriend." Without warning, she grabbed Anna's shoulders and planted a wet kiss on Anna's mouth. She quickly wiped it away.

"Rapunzel! That's totes gay."

" _You're_ totes gay," Rapunzel retorted.

Idun appeared from around the corner, frilly apron clashing with her tailored Mulberry dress. She looked effortlessly bemused and puzzled. "Girls... what on earth are you doing?"

"Hey, Mrs A. Just laying down some sick burns on your daughter, yo." Rapunzel flicked her fingers; it made a _crack_ sound.

"Ri-ght," said Idun.

"Yeah. Don't do that, Punz. It's just weird," said Anna.

Rapunzel shrugged. "Everyone's a critic." She let Idun bring her in for a hug. Just as Elsa attempted a retreat back to her bedroom, Rapunzel spotted her.

"Hey! You're Elsa, right?" she called.

Anna waved her over. "Come here, Elsa. Stop being so shy."

Elsa approached the two girls, wishing she could go back and read her book. "Um, hi."

She felt her cousin surveying her. "So. You're the surprise sister."

"That's me," she said.

"All Anna's done on the phone for the last few weeks is talk about you."

Elsa felt herself flushing. "You have?"

Misinterpreting her embarrassment, Anna said quickly, "Good things, all good things..."

"Well, you sure lucked out, getting this dork for a sister..."

"Ha. Ha," Anna interjected.

"But I can only imagine how weird it must be. Y'know, to find out you have a whole other family you didn't know existed..."

"Yeah. Weird... sums it up pretty well," she said. Both girls laughed.

Startling her, because the buzzer was right above their head, the doorbell went again.

"Well... that's probably lover-boy now," said Rapunzel. Anna exploded into action. As she dove for door handle however, she paused.

"How do I look?" she said to Rapunzel, tugging at her top.

"Butt-ugly," Rapunzel replied, as she threw her head back and laughed.

"You're a useless boyfriend, Punz," Anna huffed, before she turned to Elsa. "How'd I look?"

She blinked. "Fine," she said.

" _See_?" Anna extended a hand to her, glaring at Rapunzel, who was still laughing her ass off. "That's proper answer."

"Make her your boyfriend then, if you love her so much," Rapunzel said.

"Punzie, sisters can't be boyfriends. Duh."

"Maybe you should let your _real_ boyfriend in then. Duh."

The doorbell buzzed again.

"Oh. Right. Hans!" Anna exclaimed, as she went for the door, Rapunzel collapsing into hysterics.

* * *

Anna really hadn't been joking about her mother's cooking. It truly was awful. In theory, it was supposed to a roast dinner. But that really was just in _theory_. In reality the roast potatoes were hard as rocks, the meat overcooked and the vegetables boiled alive and tasteless. The yorkshires were just about okay if you pulled off the burnt bits.

Elsa went to work on a slab of beef, feeling like she'd need a chainsaw to get through it. _This family would self destruct without Gerda,_ she thought.

"How's your mother, Rapunzel honey?" Idun asked, as Elsa watched Anna discreetly discard her potatoes in the flower vase.

"She's okay," said Rapunzel. "We've, um, not been getting along so well recently though."

"I know all about that," said Idun, eyes moving to Anna, who froze, apparently not as discreet as she thought. She stuffed a yorkshire in her mouth with a big smile and gave her a thumbs up. Idun raised her eyes to the heavens.

"It's just that, I've been thinking after my GCSE's I'd like to study art at college. But the college I want to go to is across the city and I'd have to take the train to get there..."

"Ah," said Idun, as though she understood. Elsa didn't, however.

"I know that she's just worried about me, but I've caught the underground a dozen times with Anna now. So I was wondering if maybe you could talk to her...?" She spoke imploringly, looking between Idun and Elsa's father.

But he shook his head. "I'm not sure it would make much of a difference. When your mother sets her mind to something... she really sets her mind to it."

"I'm sure she's just thinking about what's best for you, darling," said Idun.

"Yeah... I know..." Rapunzel said, poking dejectedly at her runner beans.

Anna coughed, and said something that sounded like, "Emotional blackmail."

"You're not helping, Anna," said Idun.

She threw her hands up. "Oh, _I'm sorry_. I forgot. We're not allowed to say what we're really thinking. That might make someone feel _uncomfortable_. We wouldn't want that."

Well, she wasn't wrong there. Anna _hmph_ 'd and sat back heavily in her seat. The silence was as thick as Idun's gravy. Even the scrape of Elsa's fork as she set it down sounded too loud. Her eyes met Hans' across the table. She never thought she'd share an understanding with Anna's boyfriend before.

He cleared his throat. "Mr Anderson, I understand Arendelle International has been branching out into the digital market. Is that right?"

Her father looked positively tickled by Hans' interest. "Well, Hans, we've been interested in it for a while. We've been a leader in technology solutions for over a decade now, and-"

Anna slumped down onto the table, head in her hands. With one finger she rolled a brussel sprout.

"Anna, don't play with your food," said Idun.

"What else am I supposed to do with it? I definitely can't _eat_ it," Anna mumbled.

"What was that?"

"Nothing," Anna said.

Her father was in full spiel now. "-So I started thinking about how to maximise efficiency. So I took the number of ports. So let's see... 475 and divide that by 21..." Grabbing his napkin, he unclipped his fountain pen and begun working out the long division.

"22.6," Elsa said.

He lifted his eyes from the page. "Come again?"

"22.6. It's the answer."

All of the eyes on the table were on her now. _I wish I hadn't said anything now,_ she thought.

Her father did the rough working out, and after a minute announced, "She's right."

"Do you have your phone hidden under there or something?" Rapunzel asked, peering under the tablecloth to see if she'd hidden some kind of calculator.

"I just did it in my head..." she said.

"No way." Rapunzel spoke quite firmly.

"Yes way," Anna chimed in. "Elsa's a genius, you know. You should see her notebook: she does geometry. _For fun_."

"You like doing maths, Elsa?" It was her father who spoke. She still wasn't used to him addressing her directly.

"Ye-yeah. I do."

He eyed her contemplatively, thumb pressed against his chin.

Anna and Rapunzel were in open disagreement now: " _Nobody_ does maths for fun," Rapunzel scoffed.

"Elsa does," Anna said proudly.

"...Even algebra?"

Her father pushed his napkin across the table to her. On it he'd drawn a triangle with one side missing its length. "See if you can work that out Elsa."

It didn't take her two seconds. "It's 22.33 recurring."

Her father was looking at her as though seeing her for the first time.

"Whoah," said Rapunzel.

"Told you," Anna said, a note of triumph in her voice. She settled back quite comfortably in her chair. "My sister's smarter than all of you idiots put together."


	10. burnt out fag ends

A sour note of bonfires and burnt plastic stuck to the air. It was august: a hot, sticky august, and Elsa was eight years old.

Walking through the grey, concrete council estate, she kept her eyes to the curb, kicking a Sprite can along the tarmac. Gum freckled the pavement like moles. The drains were clogged with burnt out fag ends.

Elsa didn't look up until she reached Mr Ahmed's shop. The bell tinkled as she entered. She scuffed her feet on the mat. The corner shop was not much more than a narrow rectangle, cans stacked high, with little room to move. She snatched a quick glance at Mr Ahmed, stood behind the register talking with a younger man she'd always assumed to be his son. The warble of Punjabi radio. She withdrew the crumpled list from her pocket and quickly picked out the things her mother asked for. It was with trepidation she approached the counter.

"Do you have..." her eyes darted briefly to her list, "cayenne pepper?"

"Shelf next to the dog food," said the young man.

"Is your mother making a curry? You should tell her: cayenne pepper makes a great chicken korma," said Mr Ahmed.

"She's using it for her cold," Elsa said. She didn't look at him as she said it.

"She gargles it?" said Mr Ahmed's son.

"Yeah." It was pretty gross.

Mr Ahmed tapped in all her purchases on the till and handed them to her in a Safeway bag. Elsa paid him and passed the money to top up their electric meter.

"Tell her if she's got any left over to try it in a korma. She won't regret it."

"I will."

Mr Ahmed's son handed something to her. "Here. Take some of these."

Elsa stared at the foil packet in her hand. It had some strange looking cartoon creatures on the front. _Pokemon Booster Pack,_ it read.

"I don't have enough money," she said.

"Take it," Mr Ahmed's son said. "I wish my daughter was as responsible as you."

Her eyes flicked up for a second to the man's smiling face. He wasn't as young as Elsa thought. Maybe he was Mr Ahmed's brother, instead of his son.

Clutching the pack to her chest, she silently stepped back, and without a word left the shop. The bell tinkled behind her.

Elsa hurried back to the house, not even stopping to jump the cracks in the pavement. She was almost home, opening the garden gate with a squeak when she froze.

There were two men at the door. One had a clipboard; the other was pounding at the door with a huge hairy fist. At the sound of the gate, he turned round to look at her. He was massive.

"You live here?" he asked.

Their van was parked on the pavement outside. The side of it read: _County Council Bayliffs_.

Her hands were trembling. "N-no," she lied.

Elsa sat on the wall the other side of the road, waiting for the men to leave. The stone was warm from the sun; she dug her fingers into the holes in the bricks. The burly man kept banging the door, and Elsa opened the foil packet. It was full of cards, each with a different creature on it.

"I collect those, too."

Elsa started. A boy was stood just a few feet from her, his dog on a leash. He had messy blond hair and there was a patch on his trousers. "What did you get?" he asked, approaching to peer over at her cards. Instinctively, she crushed them protectively to her chest. "Do you have charizard? If you do I'll do a trade. I've been trying to get him for ages."

Words were leaving the boy's mouth but she didn't have the foggiest what they meant. "...Charizard?" she asked.

"Let me see your cards."

Curiosity won over, and reluctantly she handed them to him. Apparently, there was no charizard (whatever that was). "But hey, you've got butterfree! Want to trade?" From his packet he pulled out a whole _wadge_ of cards. He started shuffling through them. "I could give you raichu... or I've got two dragonairs..."

She felt something soft and heavy land on her foot. Elsa looked down to see the boy's dog slump down on her, tail wagging, tongue lolling, looking at her expectantly as though she had treats.

"...Or I _guess_ I could give you my mew. I like mewtwo better, anyway..."

Across the road, the two men gave up. Leaving without even closing the garden gate, they climbed into their van and started the engine.

"I have to go," she said quickly, shoving her cards into her pocket.

"Hey, do you live round here? I don't think I've seen you before," the boy said. She slid off the wall. "Do you go to Millbrook school?"

An anxious glance back towards the house. "I have to go," she repeated, watching as the council bayliffs' van disappeared round past the betting office.

His dog jumped towards her to give Elsa a friendly licking. The boy pulled him back with the leash. "Hey, down, Sven!" There was disappointment in his voice: "Oh, well... maybe we could trade next time? Or you could bring all your cards and we could have a Pokemon battle?"

"Maybe," she called, but she was already across the road. Her mind was somewhere else: she didn't plan for there to be a _next time_.

* * *

The door closed heavily behind her. Inside, there was darkness. The lights were off, the curtains drawn. The only light crept in through the cracks in the blinds, filtering onto the floor in flickering bars.

"Mum? Those guys are gone now." Elsa clicked on the kitchen light. "Mum?" she called, the word rising in anxiety.

"I'm in here, Elsa." Her mother's voice came from inside her bedroom. Elsa let out a breath she didn't realise she was holding.

The curtains shut, she sat on her bed in her dressing gown, lit by the dim halo of the bedside lamp. She was studying the pages of an unfamiliar photo album.

"I hope I didn't worry you," Elsa said. She studied her mother closely. "I tried to get back as quick as could, but the men outside wouldn't leave..."

Her mother waved this away. "Don't worry about that," she said, and she patted the space beside her. "Come and sit with me. See what I found."

Her mother was positively _perky_. Puzzled but relieved, Elsa slipped up beside her on the bed and peered at the photo album. She didn't remember seeing it before.

"Is that me?" she asked, pointing a finger at a photo of a baby dressed in blue.

"Yes, that's you."

She lent over close. "I was pretty cute."

An arm wrapped around her. Her mother pulled her in for a cuddle. "You still are!"

Squished against her bosom, she asked, "Is that Grandma? She looks kind of strange."

Her mother laughed. "That was at her 60th birthday party. Andrew kept giving her glasses of wine, and she got pretty tipsy... oh, and there's Ed! He would always wear that outrageous suit. That was when he was married to Sharon. They're divorced now, after she found out about the incident with the fruit salad..."

As she talked and laughed, flipping through the old memories of the album, Elsa begun to relax, and leant in against her.

"There's your Uncle Richard. He moved to Canada four years ago. And that's..."

She flipped the page. The first photo there was of herself, building a tower of bricks. Hair done in a cute braid. Blue headband. Eyes turned towards the camera with a huge smile. But she wasn't the sole focus of the photo. Sat by her side was a baby with a tuft of red hair, a second away from smashing Elsa's tower down.

"That's my sister," she said.

"Yes..." Her mother's smile was gone.

Elsa tugged at her sleeve. "She's cute, too."

But her mother wasn't paying attention to her anymore.

Elsa's eyes bored into the picture of her sister. Her mother talked about Anna so often, and told so many stories about her that she started to think she could remember them. She would often chime in, "I remember that!" and her mother would laugh softly and sadly. "Elsa... you were too young," she would say.

And yet, looking at the picture, she was sure the little red-haired baby was familiar. She didn't remember the incident in the photo, but she recalled the touch of a smaller hand; a pink cup that wasn't hers; the feeling of someone small and soft snuggled in her bed against her sleeping.

She might not remember her, but she knew her.

Her eyes moved to another picture her mother must not have noticed. Her mum, with a man. She knew him, too.

It must be an old photo. When she was very little she remembered- or thought she remembered- seeing her mother cuddling him in the kitchen. Back when they lived in the other house. They definitely didn't cuddle any more. Usually, there was just shouting. Or she would refuse to let him in entirely.

In the picture, though, they were stood outside the Eiffel tower, her dad's hand draped over her mum's shoulder. They were smiling. Her mum was wearing lipstick. She looked happy.

" _Elsa, your father is a bad man. Stay away from him. Don't trust him. If he comes to the door, don't let him in. Don't believe what he says."_

And yet, in the photograph, she was smiling.

Elsa watched as her mother's eyes moved to the picture. And without a word, she unclipped the photo and swallowed it in her hand.


	11. genetic make-up

Thump. _Thump_. **Thump**.

Elsa pressed her head against her hand. Sat at her desk, her textbook illuminated by the halo of the desk lamp, she'd been staring at the equations for several minutes now without seeing them.

_If X equals 17, then y is-_

A loud girlish squeal erupted from the corridor, followed by a loud, **thump**.

Elsa's father and Idun weren't at home. From what Anna told her, it sounded like he'd finally managed to bring Idun round, and the five-day luxury cruise he'd whisked her off on was to make up for things. While they sat in deck chairs soaking up the balmy Mediterranean sun drinking cocktails with bits of fruit floating in them, or whatever it was you were meant to do on a cruise, Gerda was supposedly left in charge.

Supposedly being the very liberal use of the word.

"-And the world champion prepares for the jump. Anna Anderson, competing the 6th annual settee Olympics-"

This was followed by a very loud cheer from Rapunzel.

Elsa didn't have a clue what Anna and their cousin was up to, and she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to find out.

Her head bowed over the paper, she tried to lose herself in the numbers. _X is 17. So y is-_ Eureka! She had it. She snatched up her pen, and-

**THUMP.**

Elsa spun round in her chair. Her door had flown open and crashed against the wall. Splayed face forward on her floor, hair-a-tangle, Rapunzel was wedged in her doorway.

"Um," said Elsa.

A hand emerged from the sea of hair. Breaking through the waves of blond curls, it reached tentatively for freedom.

"Help," called Anna.

"Soz, Anna," said Rapunzel, sitting up and slinging her hair over her forearm to reveal Anna laid flat on her stomach.

"What happened?" said Elsa.

"We were coming to see you, and I tripped on Punz's hair.- geroff me, will you Punz?"

Rapunzel got up, and offered Anna a hand. "That really hurt when you stood on my hair, you know," she complained.

"That's not my fault. Maybe you could try, I don't know, getting a _haircut_."

"You _know_ my Mum won't let me-"

Elsa looked longing back at her textbook. The answer was completely gone out of her head now.

"Hey Elsa," said Anna, and Elsa swung back in the chair to face her. "So we were thinking-"

"-it might be really fun if-" Rapunzel interrupted.

"-we give you a makeover!" said Anna.

Elsa looked between the two girls. "You've got to be kidding me," she said, before she turned back round and begun flipping through her book.

"C' _mon_ Elsa. It'll be fun," said Anna.

_If the common denominator is 13, then-_

"Please?"

"I have homework to do," said Elsa.

"You mean someone forgot to mention that homework is voluntary...?"

Elsa swung round. The grin on Anna's face was positively impish.

"I know I'm ignorant about a lot of things, but I'm not stupid, Anna Anderson," she said.

Rapunzel started cracking up at that. "Oh, man. You're going to need some serious burn cream for that, Anna Anderson."

"Oh, shut up Rapunzel-"

Elsa couldn't help but smile a little, too.

Anna crossed the room and slid up onto her desk. The light from the desk lamp caught in her hair and brought out the red in it.

"Seriously, Elsa. It'll be fun. It's boring just to sit in your room and study all of the time."

But, studying was what Elsa knew how to do. She'd been doing it for years without

realising it. It was easy. Familiar.

She crossed her arms, uncomfortable. Hedging, "I don't know..." Fingers, digging into the soft fabric of her jumper.

...It wasn't that she _liked_ sitting in her room all alone, listening to other people having fun...

"Pleeeeeeease, Elsa."

"Okay... I guess."

* * *

Anna's walk-in closet was almost the size of her bedroom. Countless rails of clothes. Air wrapped dresses, many with the tags still on. Drawer after drawer of shoes, all lit by the soft ambient pink light of the chandelier.

Her mirror was full-length, surrounded by bright white light bulbs, the kind you might see at the fairground fun house. In it, Elsa saw herself, flanked by Anna and Rapunzel. Her sister was leant on her shoulder. They were checking out the damage, and it wasn't good.

It might be unusual for a seventeen-old girl, but Elsa wasn't in the habit of looking in the mirror. Her appearance wasn't something she thought about a lot. It was something that was just _there_.

Now, looking in the mirror, the reflection staring back at her dismayed her. "Oh..." she said. She couldn't help but compare: Rapunzel's glossy golden locks to her own mop of hair, scraped back into a messy ponytail, dull and lacklustre. Anna's cute dress, and her own frumpy ankle-length skirt and jumper. Her hollow eyes.

Her reflection was clutching hold of her sleeve anxiously. It looked pale and unkempt, and not-quite-there. A lump rose in Elsa's throat. For the first time she saw what they must see: a ghost.

"I've changed my mind," she said, voice a rising crescendo, pulling away from Anna.

"Wait, Elsa."

Indecision made her pause.

"It'll all wash off," Anna said.

Elsa blinked. It took her a second to understand Anna was talking about make-up.

_It'll all wash off._

If only it were all that easy.

"It's not that-" she said.

"Then what?"

How could she even begin to explain?

_You're so beautiful, and I'm me._

_I don't belong here._

_I want to be on my own._

Anna clasped her hand. "Just try it, Elsa?"

...But, she didn't want to be _alone_.

A murmur, "Alright..."

* * *

Discarded clothes, hurled into a mounting pile on the ground. Anna's massive make-up case looked like a box full of candy. Max Factor "manga" lashes; lipstick, all red; a rainbow spectrum of nail polish. Elsa rolled some kind of pencil in her hand. "What's this?" she asked.

"Eye-liner," Anna said, and Elsa flushed.

Rapunzel brushed out her hair in smooth, long strokes. The muscles in her shoulders that knotted under the familiar touch begun to relax as Rapunzel brought the brush through her hair. It felt really nice.

"Your hair's really good, Elsa. You should take better care of it," Rapunzel said. "It takes me an hour before school to brush mine out and braid it all."

Clothes. Countless clothes. Rapunzel picking up a taffeta coloured crop top from the pile and asking, "Anna, can I borrow this?"

"Sure."

It made Elsa think of when she was small, wearing her mother's silk scarves, clomping about in her oversized high heels. _"Mummy, do I look like a grown up?"_

Playing pretend. Sharing lipstick. Laughing. Anna: "Tell me my hair looks sexy pulled back."

Rapunzel, pulling a pout: "Your hair looks sexy pushed back."

Maybe, this was the same thing.

Elsa laughed with them, but she didn't catch the reference. Part of her was distant, detached.

"Elsa, hold still now."

She could count every single individual eyelash. Anna was crouched close to apply Elsa's mascara, eyebrows furrowed together. Unconsciously, biting her lip in concentration.

Elsa resisted the urge to pull away from the close contact.

"You gotta keep still, or I'm going to mess it up," her sister warned her.

"R-right, sorry."

"You don't need to look so scared! I'm a pro. I won't get it in your eye, promise," said Anna. The dimples in her cheeks as she grinned.

"S-sorry."

"You don't need to keep apologising, Elsa."

"Sor-" Elsa stopped herself before she could finish. Anna laughed.

"Don't you worry about a thing. I am going to make you look _fine_."

When their work was finished, she was told to close her eyes.

"Don't you think this is a little much?" she asked, following her sister's guiding hand.

"Shh! Don't spoil my fun," she heard Anna say.

From somewhere behind her, she heard Rapunzel's giggling.

"If you're leading me off the roof, I'm not going to forgive you!" she said.

"You can open them now," said Anna.

Elsa opened her eyes, and the image she saw in the mirror startled her.

"What do you think?" Rapunzel asked, hands clasped together in excitement.

She was wearing a cute blue dress with sequins, and white leggings. Her hair Rapunzel had done up in an elegant braided bun behind her head. With the foundation, the bags beneath her eyes weren't nearly as prominent. Her eyelids were dusted with a touch of purple eye shadow, and she was wearing lipstick.

"You are going to have the boys _falling_ at your feet," Rapunzel said, but Elsa barely heard her.

She knew the face looking back at her.

When was it that her mother had climbed into her reflection?

In the shape of her eyes, she saw her. In the curve of her face. The resemblance must have always been there, but Elsa hadn't seen it until she Anna put on her lipstick, in the same shade of red her mother wore.

She couldn't take it. Barging past Anna and Rapunzel, Elsa ran from her reflection.

* * *

"Elsa?"

Elsa laid on her bed, staring without seeing out at the lights of the city. Sadness, she let settle over her like a thick, heavy blanket.

She heard her door click open. "Elsa... can I come in?" It was a pretty funny question to ask, seeing as she'd come in already anyway. Anna padded across the carpeted floor, and Elsa felt the bed sink at the other end as she sat down.

"What's wrong?"

She pushed her face into the pillow. Said, in a muffled voice, "Nothing."

"We didn't do _that_ bad a job, did we?"

A hiccup of laughter. "It's n-not that," she said.

"Cuz honest, I've never done Punz's makeup so badly she cried before."

Elsa lifted her face from the pillow. Anna was sat cross-legged on the bed, smiling sheepishly.

"You did a good job," she managed out. "It looks-" she gave a good sniff, "-really great."

"Ah, Elsa..."

"What?" Elsa said. Anna was staring at her weirdly. Elsa raised her hand and touched the ends of her fingertips to her face. They came away black.

Anna stifled a giggle behind her hand. "You kinda look like a panda."

There was a nasty black smudge smeared all over her white pillow, too.

"Hold on one minute. I'll get my make-up wipes."

Anna grabbed the packet from her room, and she and Elsa sat opposite one another on the bed, Anna cleaning up the mess she'd made of herself. As she worked in silent concentration, Elsa stared at her own knotted fingers in her lap.

Lightly, Anna asked, "So... what was it that upset you?"

"I... I missed my Mum." To Anna's obvious confusion, she explained: "She always wore the same shade of lipstick. And..."

As she looked at Anna, she saw it in her, too: less pronounced than in herself, but parts of their mother were in her as well.

How long did Agdar and Idun intend to lie to Anna for?

"Oh," said Anna, adding awkwardly, "That sucks. Um. Maybe we could use a different colour next time." Hesitation. "If there's a next time-" she amended.

Elsa jumped in: "Yeah. I mean... it was, fun."

Tentative smiles. Anna cleaned away the last of her make-up.

As though she hadn't barged in through her door, Anna suggested, "If you wanted, I could leave you alone, and stop bugging you, if you wanted to think about stuff...?"

"It's okay," said Elsa. She'd spent too much time over the past few weeks, thinking. And the conclusion she'd come to was it led to no conclusion at all. She swallowed down the hard lump in her throat. "I-... I don't want to be alone."

* * *

The living room was a real tip. Gerda hadn't been away one day and there were drink cans littering the floor and an empty pizza box. Her clean white sheets had been pulled from the airing cupboard and used as makeshift ski slopes, as part of the annual settee winter Olympics.

Now, she, Anna and Rapunzel pulled them from the sofa to make a den by the big glass windows. Dragged out Anna's mattress from her room. They turned off the lights and snuggled down under the duvets.

Anna slipped her hand into hers. Neither said anything, but their hands spoke, firing neurons between synapses.

 _I'm with you,_ they said.

Elsa drifted to sleep, floating amidst the phosphorescence and electric suns of the city skyline.


	12. social awkwardness 101

As the bell rung on a Monday morning, chiming in her third week at North Mountain Academy, Elsa's hypothesis was confirmed. Her conclusion: that she didn't like school.

Just getting to class in time was like running a gauntlet. When the bell rung, the corridors burst like an overflowing dam of students, a tidal wave that forced you in the opposite direction you wanted to go. Go against the flow, and you'd be trodden on.

Her lessons were a mixed bag. She liked reading books for English but thought the rest was a waste of time. History was moderately interesting most of the time, and easy, since most of it was memorising dates and names. Science she liked. Maths lessons were easily her favourites.

But she couldn't raise her hand in class. Or even ask the boy sitting next to her to borrow his tip-ex. She'd spent a good twenty minutes trying to work up the courage to ask him last week, and by the time she began to stutter out her request, the bell rung.

"What did you say?" he asked.

"N-nothing," said Elsa, leaping out of her seat and grabbing her backpack.

Sat in the same seat next to the same boy a week later, she stole from him a quick glance. As the memories returned, hot humiliation rushed up her to her cheeks.

Why was it so hard just to _talk_ to someone?

Elsa thought they ought to let her teach a class. They could call it S _ocial Awkwardness 101_.

When the bell rung, Elsa packed up her things and made for the door. But a voice stopped her: "Elsa, could I please have a moment with you?"

Elsa froze. Her teacher, Miss Murakami, waited until the classroom was empty and it was just the two of them.

"Did I get a question wrong, Miss?" Elsa enquired.

"On the contrary, Elsa, you got all of them right."

"Then..." Then what was the problem?

"You needn't look so worried, Elsa. You've done nothing wrong. You were the only one in the class to get full marks in the last bit of homework I set. Honestly, the level you're working at exceeds the work the undergraduate students used to turn in when I worked for the university... I just wanted to speak to you about class participation."

The warm glowy feeling in her stomach from Miss Murakami's praise curdled. She had a distinct feeling where this was going.

"Earlier when I asked the question about balancing fractions, nobody managed to get the correct answer. But I happened to catch a glimpse of your notebook when I went past. You'd got it right, Elsa." Miss Murakami's enquring eyes seemed to drill into hers. Elsa looked down. "Why didn't you put your hand up?"

She felt the dampness spreading at the nape of her neck and under her armpits. She didn't say anything.

"Are you afraid of getting the wrong answer?" Miss Murakami asked.

The word left Elsa in a relieved rush: "Y-yeah," she lied.

"It's human to make mistakes. I promise you, no one will think badly for getting a question wrong." Miss Murakami spoke in a softly reassuring voice, but beneath her blouse and blazer which suddenly felt far too hot, Elsa was stewing in fear and humilation. She stared at a tile on the floor without seeing it. "Elsa?" said Miss Murakami. A hand touched her shoulder.

It was a snap reaction. Without meaning to, Elsa jumped away from her as though she'd been burned. Her teacher's eyes reflected her surprise. And, Elsa thought, a little bit of hurt, too. Her insides shrivelled like blackened bits of tinder.

"C-can I g-go now?" she stammered.

"Of course." Miss Murakami was looking dismayed. "But-"

Grabbing her bag, Elsa almost ran from the classroom.

* * *

Hurrying back to the Sixth Form, Elsa wasn't watching where she was going. In her head she replayed the horrible exchange over and over, stewing in the shame that roiled in her stomach. _Why did I do that? Why did I say that? s_ he asked herself. _What on earth is wrong with me? It can't be normal to feel this way._

She peered into the common room. It was one of the places she could get on with her homework peacefully, since it was forbidden to the lower school. But today a big group of Sixth Formers were sat talking and laughing in the comfy chairs, and Elsa didn't feel put-together enough to face their questions: _What school did you go to before? What subjects do you take? How come you're always alone?_

The computer room, too, was full, and outside the September heatwave had broken into October drizzle. Was there any place she could be alone?

 _That creepy clock-tower,_ Elsa remembered. _Anna might be there, too._

Elsa couldn't get comfortable around other people. But for some reason, recently, Anna had become the exception. Thinking about their sleepover in the living room, and how she'd woken up to find Anna's hand still in hers, Elsa smiled quietly to herself.

In the bell-tower, it was dark. Gripping the handrail, Elsa looked up into the blackness. She heard something like a _thump_. Cautiously, she made her way up, to find the trapdoor ajar.

"Anna?" she called.

The ladder creaked underfoot. Pushing back her second thoughts, Elsa climbed up into the belfry.

It was empty. _Though I'm sure I heard something..._

As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, illuminated only by the grey light filtering through the high window, Elsa noticed a bulky shape near the wall.

"Anna!" she exclaimed, rushing to her. Anna was slumped over onto her side, motionless, her red hair splayed over the dusty floorboards. Elsa shook her violently, her heart racing. Had she collapsed? Was she sick? _"Anna!"_

A groggy groan was her response. "No need t' shout..."

Elsa breathed out relief. "I thought you were..."

"Jus' taking a nap," said Anna, pushing herself from the floor with one hand. "Or, I was." She pushed her hair back out of her eyes. Elsa couldn't help but notice a certain sluggishness to Anna's movements. The way she seemed to be struggling to focus on her.

"Are you sure you're alright?" she asked.

"Fine, fine, fine as a fiddle."

Elsa glanced at the chalk outline of a figure on the wall, notched with marks. At least Anna wasn't playing with knives today. She watched as Anna lit up a cigarette, and took a drag.

"Do you come here to smoke?"

"And to take naps," said Anna. "No lecture, please. I've already had one from Hans today." Her lips sculpted her boyfriend's name in acute annoyance.

"You had another fight?"

"He told me I shouldn't-... let's just say, he was trying to tell me what to do." The bite of anger and resentment in her voice.

And the thought occurred to Elsa: it was like her sister was two separate people. Her playful, goofball of a sister, constructing the Winter Settee Olympics in the living room with Rapunzel. And this cynical stranger, the glowing orange smoulder of her cigarette reflecting distant eyes.

Which one, Elsa wondered, was the real Anna?


	13. capturing shadows

Talking to her father, Elsa still felt like she was speaking with a stranger.

The crack of blue LED light laid across the corridor. The door to Agdar's study stood open, but she knocked, anyway.

He turned round in his desk chair, face silhouetted by the glare from the screen, looking Elsa over in surprise. "Come in, Elsa. What can I do for you?"

 _What can I do for you?_ Maybe part of being a CEO meant that every exchange became a business transaction.

Elsa crossed the room and held out the permission slip.

"Hm? What's this?"

"Permission. For a school trip to the science museum," said Elsa, standing awkwardly as he took the letter, eyes scanning the details in a swift motion. "Sounds fine to me. Are you interested in this kind of thing?"

"Y-yeah."

He removed his fountain pen from the pot and signed on the dotted line, handing the letter back to her. "I'm very glad you're taking an interest in your education, Elsa. I actually spoke with your maths teacher yesterday."

"Miss Murakami?" Elsa said in surprise.

Adgar nodded. "She's very pleased with the work you've been turning in. Though she told me that, understandably, your knowledge is patchy. I've been thinking it would be a good idea for a while, but her phone call drove home that we need to get you a tutor."

"A tutor?"

"His name's Kai. Very good at what he does. He'll come to the house a couple of times a week and work on getting you up to speed with the curriculum. What do you think?"

"It's probably a good idea," said Elsa. She hated it when the teacher asked a simple question and she didn't know the answer.

And, she could never get her mind off the idea that the other students were secretly laughing at her for it.

"Great." Adgar turned thoughtful. "Is it just your class that's going on the trip?" he asked.

"I think it's open to the whole school."

"Do you know if your sister is going, by any chance?" Adgar asked.

Elsa shook her head. "I'm not sure. You'd have to ask her."

The corner of Agdar's mouth twitched into a wry smile. "If I asked her, she'd probably become determined _not t_ o go," he said with a chuckle.

 _Probably,_ Elsa agreed silently.

* * *

Elsa was forced to knock twice, because of the sheer volume of sound pouring from her sister's room.

Over the blaring music, she heard Anna's faint call: "Come in!"

As she came in, Anna, lounging in her unmade bed, leant over to turn down the volume on her stereo. The TV was tuned in to some kids cartoon Anna wasn't paying attention to and her laptop was set up on the bed, duvet flung out the way and sheets rumpled as a sailor's knot. Anna shifted over and patted down the space beside her. She wore a plaid pajama top with frogs on, and just pants. This was pretty normal. The first week Elsa moved in with the Andersons, she'd heard Idun demanding several times her daughter put some clothes on.

Elsa sat in the space offered, and glanced towards Anna's laptop. She had open a dozen tabs and was playing some kind of game on Facebook.

"How can you even pay attention with all this noise?" Elsa asked, before she was drowned out by it. Anna turned the stereo down a few more notches.

"Hm? What?" she asked.

Elsa shook her head. "What are you watching?" she asked.

Anna glanced over at the TV. "Not really sure, tbh."

"Tee-bee-hache?" Elsa said.

Anna rolled her eyes. "To be honest."

"To be honest, what?" Elsa asked, baffled.

" _To be honest_ , anyone would think you lived under a rock before you came to live with us, Elsa. Did you actually used to have any friends?"

Elsa bit down on the soft flesh on the inside of her cheek. The ghosts of old insults hissed in her eardrums: _Weirdo. Loner._

When Anna first used to ask Elsa these kinds of questions, she'd thought she was mocking her. But there was no sneer on her lips. Only curiosity in her eyes.

She'd come to understand: in many ways, Anna was still a child. Blunt. Insensitive. She didn't mean any harm.

Though, that didn't make it hurt any less.

"I- I had friends," Elsa said, hand cupping her elbow tightly.

_Well, I had one. If Kristoff counts._

She breathed deeply. "I... didn't go out a lot. Mum she... worried about me."

"Did you live in a bad neighbourhood?" Anna asked.

"Uh." Elsa found herself nodding. It was an easier explanation to swallow down. Somehow, she doubted that her sister would understand her old home life. Because most days, she didn't understand it herself.

All those years, wasted. And what was it all for?

"Don't worry. I get it." Anna leant back on the bed with her palms.

"You _do_?"

"Yeah. Until about two years ago, I wasn't allowed to leave the apartment on my own. It was too _dangerous_." Anna rolled her eyes. "Like I was going to get mugged in this part of town. Not that I had much of a chance to be gallivanting off anyway. Lessons. Practice. _Ugh_."

"What changed?" Elsa found herself asking.

Anna played with the paintbrush bristle end of her braid, running it against the back of her hand. "Hm... I played a gambit."

"And it paid off?"

Anna let her braid drop. "I don't know," she said sincerely. She stared without seeing at the TV as the cartoon characters delivered the punch line, and she was that _other_ Anna again. The Anna that hung out in clock towers with distant eyes and _maybe I'm a dirty person._

It hit Elsa, that she should do something. Hug Anna, or take her hand, or _something_ , because although she didn't know _why_ Anna was in pain, Elsa knew enough of pain to know she was suffering. _I think you can help Anna,_ Gerda had said. _Just be there for her._

Elsa's hand twitched. _Just hold her hand,_ she told herself. _Reach out and take it._

_But what if she doesn't want me to? What if it annoys her? Maybe she wants me to leave her alone. I must be annoying her. She's not saying anything. Maybe I should leave. I should leave. I-_

_That's what sisters are for,_ Gerda told her.

Elsa swallowed down the marble that was lodged in her throat, and reached for Anna's hand.

Anna snapped from her thoughts and looked down. "What are you doing?" she asked, with a tinge of amusement.

Elsa swallowed again. "Um. I, uh, I'm holding your hand. I think."

Anna blinked.

Elsa made to pull her hand away, insides twisting. "S-sorry. I s-should go-"

Her sister squeezed. Dimples appeared on her cheeks as her she smiled a smile brighter than the sun.

"Has anyone told you how absolutely fucking _adorable_ you are, Elsa?"

"Uh."

Elsa didn't have a chance to respond before Anna attacked, tackling her older sister in a flying hug that knocked both of them clean off the bed.

"Sorry," Anna said, picking herself up out of the sprawl on the floor and offering Elsa a hand up, her cheeks pink.

"I didn't realise being adorable could be so dangerous," Elsa managed out, and Anna burst into laughter. Elsa was always amazed, that she could make her sister laugh like that.

She was so embarrassed and happy that by the time Anna finished showing Elsa the game she was playing and they'd discussed who would win in a fight: Spongebob Squarepants or Batman, she'd completely forgotten about the trip to the science museum. The second she got back to her room, she ran back down the hall and asked if she was planning on coming.

"Are you going?" Anna asked.

"Yeah."

"Then yeah, I'll come."

* * *

The coach was warm and full of the buzz of excited chatter, their teacher attempting take the register above the noise.

"Michael Hill? Please, would you all be quiet-"

Elsa sat in the window seat, Anna, next to her, was fiddling with the blower above their heads.

"You just like pressing buttons, don't you?" Elsa said, amused.

"I would definitely be that one sap that presses the self-destruct button just to see what it does," Anna replied, jabbing the blower on.

"I need silence for just _two minutes_ ," the teacher tried again, without much success.

For the millionth time today, Elsa prodded at her face.

"You're going to muss it up," Anna warned her.

"But it's weird," Elsa complained, rubbing at the foundation. "I can feel it, like I wearing a mask or something. And these clothes are too flashy." Since it was a Saturday, they'd been allowed to wear their own clothes. Anna's level of enthusiasm had risen several degrees when she'd discovered this prospect.

Another fact to add to Elsa's retinue of new knowledge: for some reason, wearing your own clothes to school was supposed to be very exciting.

Except, Elsa mostly just felt self-conscious.

Anna rolled her eyes. "Elsa, you're wearing jeans and a t-shirt."

" _Expensive_ jeans and a t-shirt. I don't see why I couldn't have worn my own clothes."

"Elsa, listen to me." Anna's gaze was serious. "I've been to school with these idiots for years. I know what they're like. If they saw you in that horrendous cookie monster t-shirt of yours, they'd make fun of you. I'm not going to let them do that."

Annoyingly, she knew that Anna was right. She looked around the coach at the other teenagers. They got few days to dress up and preen, so they were dressed to _impress_. It still turned her stomach how obscenely rich everyone at this school was. They threw money around like it was nothing. Just the girl sat in the row opposite her had a Gucci handbag sat in her lap. And even Elsa knew who Gucci was.

Instead she protested, "...It's not horrendous."

"I'm sorry, but it really, really is, Elsa."

"SILENCE!" Everyone hushed as Mr Roades, the P.E teacher who enjoyed making students do push-ups in the mud, stepped up onto the coach. "Until you all shut up, this coach is not moving an inch. Unless the register is taken, the trip is cancelled and for wasting my time, I'll waste your time. In detention after school on Monday."

Everyone quickly shut up.

Mr Roades took the register from his sheepish colleague, and barked out the first name: "Michael Hill!"

"Yes sir!"

"Sarah Cook!"

"Yes sir!"

"Elsa Hall!"

"Y-yessir!"

The rest of the journey went without disturbance.

* * *

The science museum was amazing. Four stories high and so much to see Elsa didn't know which way to look. Except-

The tour guide who was taking round their group was putting everyone to sleep. Droning. Monotonous. The guy could make videos on youtube to help people beat insomnia.

Anna's fingers hooked round Elsa's wrist. "C'mon, let's ditch this lot," she whispered.

"We can't do that!" Elsa hissed.

"Course we can. They're all half asleep anyway. They're not going to notice us sneaking off."

Elsa stole a glance at their teacher. She looked like she was nodding off, too, a distinctly glazed look stealing over her eyes.

"Well, I guess..."

When the group moved forward to the next display, Anna pulled at her wrist and dragged the two of them down behind a giant periodic table connect-4 game. She pressed a finger to her lips, grinning. Elsa stifled her laughter under her mouth. This _was_ pretty fun. They hunkered down behind the table, waiting for the group to move on and trying not to laugh too hard.

Once the droning voice filtered away, the museum was theirs. They found an exhibit on Bernoulli's Principle: a beach ball and a blower that held it in place in mid air like it was floating.

When were done playing catch with the beach ball, they launched a miniature hot air balloon by hitting the temperature button over and over until it reached the right degrees Celsius, and battled against several kids to see who could launch their balloon fastest.

In the shadow box, a strobe light cast their shadows against the large phosphor screens, freezing them into place.. Anna and Elsa stretched, jumped, and posed as the timer clicked down, laughing when their shadows merged on the screen and they became a girl with four arms.

Then the shadows faded, and vanished.

The stairs to the biology section played musical notes when you stepped on them. Leaping up and down them, Anna played what Elsa realised with amazement was _On Top of the Smokies_.

"That's incredible!" she breathed.

Anna waved this away. "Well, I am, after all-" she pulled a pretentious voice, "- _classically_ trained."

"You play piano?" Elsa asked, impressed.

"Oh yeah," Anna said nonchalantly, hitting the c note. "The violin, too, though I never picked that up as well."

"That's amazing," Elsa said.

"If you say so," said Anna, losing interest in the piano.

"I see you guys escaped, too." Elsa's head snapped round. Leaning against the railing was a boy she recognised from the coach.

"Hey Jared," said Anna, leaping down the last step.

"Hi, Anna." Jared turned his attention towards Elsa. "You're Elsa, aren't you?"

Something twisted inside of Elsa. "Yeah," she said.

"I'm Jared. I heard this is your first year at school. I bet that's pretty weird."

As the new girl, Elsa had always known people would talk about her. All the same, it still felt unnerving that people knew things about her. It made her feel nervous. "Yeah. It is... pretty weird," she managed out.

She glanced over at Anna, wishing, pathetically- she thought, that she could hide behind her sister in this conversation. But Anna had given them space, and was, weirdly, watching with a knowing smile.

"So... do you like this science stuff?" Jared asked. He took a step towards her, and all the alarm bells in her head started going off.

"Yeah, it's... it's pretty interesting," she said, brushing her hair back self-consciously.

"Did you try out the shadow box? That was pretty cool."

"Um. Yeah, it was n-neat."

She was sweating, now. _Is he flirting with me? He's standing very close. No, he couldn't be flirting. Not with me._

Pushing his hair back, Jared moved in close, lowering his voice: "So, I was wondering, if maybe you'd like to hang out some time."

_Crap. He is flirting with me. This has to be flirting. What do I do?_

In desperation, she looked to Anna, giving her her best _come save me_ eyes. But Anna just smiled at and gave her an encouraging thumbs up.

Wait, what?

"Um. I guess, maybe..." she found herself saying.

 _It's because of this stupid makeup and outfit Anna made me wear. She's turned me into a man magnet!_ Another stolen look at Anna, who was still grinning. _Wait. Was she planning this?_

"Great! Because that new slasher movie came out yesterday, and my friend can get us in without Ids. So I was wondering, if you were free friday night-"

Elsa couldn't hear the rest of what Jareth said over the pounding blood in her ears.

She realised Jared was looking at her expectantly.

"I. Uh. I- I think I'm busy that n-n-night." _Darn it._ Her stutter. It made her want to bite her clumsy tongue off.

"Well, that's fine. How about saturday next week?"

She wanted to say to him: _I'll be busy that day, and the day after that, and the day after that, and any day you ask me._

But she didn't want to be _rude_.

But there was _no, no, no way_ she could say yes, either.

Elsa was stuck in a trap, with no way out.

"I... I have to go to the bathroom!"

Elsa ran, as fast as her legs would take her, up the stairs, a trail of notes flying after her.

When Anna found her, five minutes later, she was hiding inside a giant display of the inside of a nose, head tucked in-between her knees.

"Whoah. Totally gross," Anna laughed, ducking in under the nostril and taking hold of a huge black nose hair. "If you're hiding from Jared, he's gone now."

Elsa raised her head. She didn't know if she'd ever felt more hot and embarrassed in her life. "Was- was he mad?"

"Mad? No." Anna chuckled to herself. "I think he thought you'd started your period or something. And- typical boy- got all weirded out about it."

Elsa wasn't sure if that was worse or not.

"Ugh," she said, covering her red face in her hands. She heard the scuffle as Anna threw herself down beside her. "Why didn't you rescue me?" she bemoaned.

"I thought you were enjoying the attention," Anna said.

" _Enjoying!_?"

"You can turn him down, you know. If he gets upset, that's his problem. Not yours. Just take it as a compliment. At least it means he thought you look good."

Elsa pulled the hair clip from her hair and stared at it. "You say that like it's a good thing."

"What do you mean?" asked Anna.

"In my uniform without any make-up, nobody even looks at me twice. I don't want to talk to someone who's only interested in me because of _how I look_."

"I don't think Jared asked you out because you're wearing makeup, Elsa. You're pretty without it. It's just that _nobody_ looks flattering in our uniform," Anna laughed.

Elsa threw down the clip in frustration. "That's not my point."

Her sister was staring at her in confusion. "You don't want people to see how pretty you are?"

She thought: _I want them to see ME._

But instead, she sighed, pressing her forehead to her knees. "It's not that..."

Silence crept between them. Anna played with one of the nose hairs.

Out of the blue, Anna asked, "Are there any boys you've liked? Like, where you lived before?"

Elsa flushed. "That's..."

"I won't tell anyone if you don't want me to."

"I know. It's just... I've never really properly thought about it before."

"But you're seventeen," Anna said in disbelief.

She rephrases: "Okay... it's not like I haven't _thought_ about it. But I've never really liked any boys in … in that way before."

She thought about the boys she knew from home. The ones who hung out on the corner and yelled and threw stuff at her. The guy next door, who never talked to her. The only boy she'd ever got on with was Kristoff, and she definitely hadn't liked him in _that_ way.

Or she thought so, anyway. What did it feel like to "like" someone, anyway?

Anna's question was tentative: "Well... what about girls?"

"Uh."

"We are in the 21st century," Anna pointed out.

Elsa shook her head, mumbling that she hadn't really thought about that either. Suddenly worrying that her sister must think her a complete weirdo, she attempted to explain herself: "I- I know it must sound weird... sometimes I think to myself that any other girl my age must have had a dozen crushes." Her voice softened. She bit at her lip. "Th-there must be something wrong with me. I don't know."

She jumped when she felt Anna's fingers thread through her own. Yesterday, although she hadn't known it at the time, she'd set a precedence.

"There's not anything wrong with you," she said, giving her hand a squeeze. "You ever see that Disney movie, _Mulan_?"

What did Disney movies have to do with this? Elsa's brow wrinkled. "I think so."

"'The flower that blooms in adversity is the rarest and most beautiful of all,'" her sister quoted. "I love that bit. You're just a late bloomer, Elsa. That's all. You've got plenty of time to meet the one."

 _The One?_ "You believe in that stuff?" Elsa asked. "True love and all that?"

"Of course." Anna spoke without a shadow of a doubt.

"...Do you think that's what you and Hans have?"

"Yep."

The crinkles in Elsa's brow deepened. "Even though you guys fight so much?" She didn't pretend to understand their relationship in the slightest. One moment, they were the perfect Disney couple, complete with sickeningly sweet nicknames and Anna resting her head on Hans's shoulder, sighing. The next, Anna would purposely bait him, trying to get a reaction and there would be a _bite_ to the way her sister sculpted her boyfriend's name.

"You have to _fight_ for true love, Elsa," Anna said dramatically. Elsa repressed a smile. "Did I ever tell you how I met Hans?"

Elsa shook her head.

"It was at one of these mind-numbingly boring charity galas Dad insisted I come along to. Hmm, back near the start of the summer holidays. You'd hate them, Elsa. Lots of bigwigs strutting around flashing their cash pretending to be kind and generous when most of them are really just showing off how rich they are. You know how peacocks get their feathers out and parade around? Yeah, imagine _that_. They're seriously lame. I used to like them, but, _hum_. Anyway." Anna's tendency telling stories was to go off topic, to lose her place, to ramble. She paused. "Where was I? Right. I'd just got a drink and was heading back to the table, and I walked right into Hans and knocked my juice _all over him_. Like, all down his shirt. Poor guy looked like he'd been tango'd. It was just like in the movies."

Elsa frowned. "What movies?"

"I take you don't watch rom-coms often. You know, the girl bumps into the guy and knocks something all over him, or knocks him down. And then," she sighed, "they fall in love."

Elsa choked down a snigger. "Okay."

"You're laughing at me," Anna accused her.

"No, no. Never," Elsa promised, though admittedly it was getting very hard _not_ to.

Anna gave her a suspicious look and continued with her story: "Anyway. After that we spent the whole night talking. It was..." she breathed out the word: "enchanted. Like, you know, when you meet someone, and that connection is just _there_. You barely know them, but at the same time you know them. You _know_ them. You know?"

Elsa looked at her hands. Did she?

"He's The One," said Anna. "He has to be." Her tone was serious, and Elsa looked up, to see Anna's jaw tense, fingers digging into the material of her skirt.

 _He has to be._ Before Elsa could ask what she meant, a couple of children ran into the nose.

"Ewww, gross! Look at all that nose hair!"

The charged moment shattered. Their eyes met, and it must have occurred to them both at the same time: _What a terribly serious conversation to have in a giant nose._ Elsa laughed, and Anna joined her, until they gripped one another, racked with guffaws. The kids looked at them like they were strange.

But for once, Elsa didn't care.


End file.
